2 Severus Prince and the Horcrux curse
by slytherinsal
Summary: Year 2 of Sev and the Marauders. Dumbledore finds a nasty ring, and Tiberius Prince fixes things ... his way. The Marauders are still searching for horcruxes, and Voldemort gets knacky that Tiberius Prince won't be his best minion. Lucius Malfoy continues to learn life lessons, and with Tiberius as headmaster, some changes are instituted. There are, of course, pranks.


**Chapter 1**

Severus enjoyed his first summer holiday from school.

His mother welcomed Myrtle with open arms, and the young girl cried on the only mother figure she had known for almost 30 years of having been a ghost, and though Severus was not privy to the 'girl talk' they engaged in, Myrtle was a much sunnier character afterwards than she had been. She was grateful that Eileen understood the muggle world as well as being able to help her adapting to the intricacies of the etiquette and tradition required by a scion of the Prince family.

It was wonderful that the Evans parents listened to the explanation of why their daughters and they needed to be adopted, in order to protect them. Unlike Myrtle's parents they were willing to fit in to the new world their daughters had entered, and Mr. Evans had happily taken a job as manager in a wizarding world factory binding books, which was just a small step up from the job he had held at Waddington's press where he had previously worked as a foreman. Many of his underlings were goblins, but Mr. Evans, now legally Arthur Prince Evans, had no preconceived ideas and productivity had even gone up for a fair and kindly boss who made no difference for race.

Rose Prince-Evans took a part-time job in the office of the Prince Press, since secretarial skills were unaffected by a lack of magic, and were one of the jobs a squib might hold, since a quick-quotes pen was a fully enchanted item which could be used by anyone to take down what the boss said, and any copying needed was done magically by the former squib with whom Rose time-shared. Adele Brown was delighted to have had the owner perform a ritual to give her even minimal magic, as it meant her pay was increased so she could spend more time with her family when Rose was working.

Rose had no need to work, but the introduction of muggles into the wizarding work place was something Tiberius wanted to pioneer, to remove the oft-repeated accusation that muggleborn witches and wizards were torn in their loyalties as their families had lives outside of the wizarding world.

OoOoOo

The Evans family were not the only new Prince connections.

Argus had boasted of his new abilities to other squibs he knew, and Tiberius had been receiving diffident requests for aid. He had gone to see Argus, and had adopted him as a Prince, to protect him, and had offered to meet with other squibs and open their cores on the proviso that they also became his family vassals. Argus had the distinction of fuller adoption.

It was a power base drawn from the despised of society, who would do anything for the man who gave them the ability to do any magic, however small. Until Tom Riddle was dead, for once and all, there was a war going on; and the more to oppose him and his death eaters the better. And along with squibs, there were werewolves. It was a harder cure, but then, there were fewer werewolves, at least, fewer who wanted the cure. It would take a while for the news to spread from the learned publications in which Tiberius had freely published all details; but it would spread.

OoOoOo

And then a floo call from Dumbledore came.

"Tiberius … I need your help." The voice of the headmaster was faint and shaking.

Tiberius stepped through the floo and Severus, who was with him, stepped right along with him. Severus was glad that his grandfather had made him practise until he could exit a floo with elegance and grace, not stumble out of it.

Dumbledore was sprawled in a chair by the fire, and his right hand was blackened. A curious ring with a black stone was winking in the flickering firelight.

"You old fool!" burst out Tiberius. He caught sight of Severus. "Severus, floo back and get dragonhide gloves, a flask of basilisk venom, several blood replenishing draughts and the vial of basilisk tears. It might work."

"Basilisk tears?" Dumbledore managed to ask.

"Shut up and tell me what you thought you were doing you senile old coot," said Tiberius in a tight, furious voice. Severus knew he would dissolve into a puddle if his grandfather ever spoke to him in that sort of voice, and he hurried to get what Tiberius had demanded. As he left he heard Dumbledore saying,

"Well I remembered the ring Tom used to wear all the time …"

When Severus came back, Tiberius had been inscribing runes on the headmaster's upper arm, above the blackened part and surrounding the arm.

"That should hold it," he said. "Good boy. Pour the venom carefully into one of those tea saucers."

"Those are my favourite …"

"Gods and little fishes, man, do you place things above your life, sanity and hope of defeating the egregious little twat? But then you have no sanity to risk," he added tartly.

"Granddad, Mum said you weren't to use words like 'twat' in front of me," said Severus, doing as he was bidden.

"No, it insults all good twats to compare Tommy Riddle to them," said Tiberius. "I apologise, my boy."

Severus didn't think that was quite what his mother had meant, but decided that saying nothing was the wiser course. Wearing dragonhide gloves, Tiberius eased the ring off the finger which looked like a blackened burned skeleton, and transferred it to the grip of the fire tongs. It writhed as he lowered it towards the basilik venom, and Severus could feel it reaching to him, telling him that Lily was never going to kiss him. _Yuk, why would I want to kiss my best friend?_ Thought Severus. Tiberius lowered it into the saucer and with a thin scream the stone was suffused with smoke and the ring around it quite dissolved away.

Dumbledore gave a cry.

"What?" snapped Tiberius.

"You have just destroyed one of the Deathly Hallows; the resurrection stone!" Dumbledore gasped.

"I just destroyed a horcrux, old man, I have no time for fairy stories."

"You don't understand; I possess the Elder Wand, and James owns the true cloak," said Dumbledore.

Severus suppressed a whistle of surprise. The Marauders – himself, James Potter, Sirius Black, Petunia and Lily Evans, Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, Charity Burbage, Narcissa Black and Xenophilus Lovegood – had discussed whether James' invisibility cloak might be the one from the story 'The Three Brothers and Death' and had thought it a little far fetched. But Dumbledore believed in it.

"There isn't much point having a special wand, because if you are disarmed with _expelliarmus_ you still have to cast wandless, so increasing what you can do is better than relying on any one wand," blurted out Severus.

Dumbledore stared at him.

"So much wisdom in one so young," he mused. And Severus felt an attempt to push into his thoughts. It was clumsy; the old man was hurt, and Severus pulled his eyes away as though looking naturally to the vial of basilisk tears.

"Will it really help?" he asked Tiberius.

"I have no idea," said Tiberius. "But this is a nasty dark curse. I can halt it but I cannot reverse it. Without my holding runes, which I shall presently tattoo to hold them permanently, the curse would eventually spread all through the meddling old fool's body over a greater or lesser time. If you thought the ring was one of Tom's horcruces whatever possessed you to put it on?"

"Because it was carved as an intaglio with the Peverell arms, and the Peverells were the ancestors of the Gaunts, descended from Slytherin, and it was the Peverells who made the Deathly Hallows," said Dumbledore.

"So James is descended from Slytherin too?" asked Severus.

"As well as whom, my boy?" asked Dumbledore.

Severus peered hard at the vial, anything but meet the headmaster's gaze.

"As well as being descended from the Peverells," he said. "We were discussing how old bloodlines intertwine."

"Ah, I see." Dumbledore would normally have twinkled to hide his intent, but he was plainly in too much pain. Tiberius hastily tattooed the runes he had drawn, and then took his silver knife and started carving runes directly into the blackened flesh of what was left of the headmaster's arm. Dumbledore cried out.

"Blood replenishing potion," snapped Tiberius, and Severus poured the first decanter full into the headmaster's mouth, as the black, oily blood flowed out of the carven runes. Tiberius kept cutting. "Another," he snapped, and Severus repeated his actions. And then Tiberius dripped the basilisk tears along the cuts he had made, and they healed up. The arm looked less undead.

"I think I stopped it before the tendrils entered the rest of your body," said Tiberius. "You note I drew the runes well above the blackness, but it has crept that far and stopped. I had to do that or risk it having already gone past a line deep inside the arm."

"I understand. I may lose the arm?"

"Old man, if you do not take a long sabbatical, you will lose your life. My rune work is not infallible; without rest it will not hold."

"Even with you working as DADA master?"

"I wasn't planning on coming back. Tom Riddle cursed the position that nobody would hold it for more than a year and I have no intent of opening myself to that curse. I stepped in as a favour to you. And no, even with me at your beck and call, any exertion would risk undoing all I have done. I'm going to floo you to St Mungos and demand that as the curse has unhinged your mind, you should be strapped to a bed."

"You wouldn't dare."

"You wouldn't want to try me, if you don't promise to vanish for a year somewhere quiet. I told you I had the hunt for horcruces in hand, and then instead of giving me information you arrogant, fatuous old idiot, you decide to try to get yourself killed."

"I only wanted to see Ariana."

"Your sister is beyond the veil and people beyond the veil should stay there. To bring them back is to create undead, and that is an act of dark magic. I can make you take an unbreakable vow, or we can go to St Mungos."

"I will take a seaside holiday," conceded Dumbledore, in a grumpy tone, "But don't blame me if Riddle acts more openly with me out of the way."

"You delude yourself," said Tiberius. "If he feared you at school it was because you might have got him expelled before he had found out all he wanted to. I doubt he fears you any more than any other wizard who opposes him. You have a lot of power at your disposal but you choose to squander it on foolishness like this," he glared scornfully at the blackened hand. "You had better contact Minerva and tell her that she, er, has the helm," he added, amused to reference the foolish muggle TV show the youngsters liked to watch. "Live long and prosper," he added. Severus smothered a giggle, and followed the patriarch back to Prince Hall.

OoOoOo

It was several days before Minerva McGonagall asked to floo into Prince Hall. Tiberius greeted her with full formality befitting a headmistress and Transfigurations Master, with Eileen, Myrtle and Severus in formal garb beside him.

"This isn't a ceremonial visit, Tiberius," Minerva said, having gone through all the ritual. As a cat animagus she was actually quite partial to greeting rituals, though she might have been more comfortable had she sniffed noses with Tiberius and mutually wafted anal glands, but in human form one did as humans did.

"Indeed, Minerva? What may I do for you?"

"I have no intention of taking the position of interim headmistress," said Minerva. "When Dumbledore returns from his … indisposition … there will be factions which will further divide the school when I stand down. It would be better to be someone who knows the pupils but who is not attached to the school long term."

"Are you trying to foist the job onto me, Minerva?"

"That was remarkably straight-talking for a Slytherin. Yes, I am. You are also rumoured to be as hard as Dumbledore and a possible deterrent to Riddle and his minions. I have written to Dumbledore with my decisions and why, and that I had already cleared it with the board of governors before approaching you before he starts getting the idea that it was your idea to pack him off for a year to get his job."

"Since I have no intention of taking the job …"

"Too late; the letter from the governors confirming your position is in the post."

"Minerva, when did you become a Slytherin behind my back?"

"Oh, it's not just Slytherin who can be sneaky. And besides, you'll want to keep an eye out for your new granddaughter, in case anyone twigs that a ghost called Myrtle disappears and a girl called Myrtle arrives. I'm not an idiot."

"Apparently not," said Tiberius. "Had you any idea who to call in to teach DADA?"

"None at all," said Minerva. "Most of the people who know anything about the dark arts are Death Eaters."

"I'd ask Aberforth Dumbledore but he's a very shy man," said Tiberius. "Abraxus Malfoy hasn't the patience. I know, Leroy Shacklebolt, he's a retired auror. He trained young Alastor Moody who has a very bright future ahead of him."

"What are you going to do about the curse?"

"I'll have him teach up to the spring term half term, and then … Eileen can finish the year."

Eileen Snape raised an eyebrow.

"I can, can I?"

"You certainly can. I hope you will."

She shrugged.

"I you insist, Grandfather, I'll liaise with Auror Shacklebolt about his syllabus some time around Christmas."

 **Chapter 2**

Platform Nine-and-three-quarters bustled with young people.

"SEV!" James Potter bellowed.

"Anyone would think your reprobate friends hadn't been to stay for a couple of weeks over the holidays," said Eileen, amused. "Well, get on board, all four of you, and then I can stop worrying about what you were all researching in the runic section of the library."

Severus flashed his mother a grin.

"I'll write to you about it when we've finished whatever detentions the headmaster sets," he said.

The Marauders mounted the train, laughing, shouting and chattering, Myrtle now quite as loud as any of them.

"And there's Sirius," said James. "Hello, mate, is this Regulus?"

"Yeah," said Sirius. "He's a good boy, is Regulus, I don't know if he's suitable to join bold bad Marauders."

"Well met, younger son of the Noble and Ancient House of Black," said Severus, formally. Regulus, who had frowned at both James and Sirius, straightened and bowed.

"Well met, I believe I address the scion of the Noble House Prince?"

"Indeed; I am Severus and I make my friend's brother free with my name. Permit me to introduce my cousin, Myrtle Prince, and my adoptive kinswomen, Petunia and Lily Prince-Evans."

"Enchanted," said Regulus. The girls greeted him properly.

Severus performed all the introductions and James held out a formal hand.

"Apologies for my informality, younger son of the Noble and Ancient House of Black," he said. "In House Gryffindor, we are as brothers and sisters, and I treated my best friend's brother as a brother."

Regulus inclined his head.

"Understood, Mr. Potter," he said.

"I make my friend's brother free with my name," said James.

Several other new children were goggling.

Severus turned to them.

"Some of you are new to the wizarding world," he said, "Or have not been reared in the knowledge of the protocols that help us not to fall into senseless duels. There will be voluntary classes on Sunday mornings which will be led by senior students and the Headmaster. You have seen here how a potential quarrel has been averted by the use of etiquette. Some houses do not observe etiquette within house, treating all as brothers; some observe more, especially House Slytherin. It is by observing etiquette that misunderstandings may be overcome. Those of you raised in the muggle world will find it hard at first, but to learn this is for your protection. It is not compulsory, but I would advise it. As the power of the dark lord rises, it is important not to get into foolish disagreements when we should all be united against him."

"Says you, Gryffindor wanker," sneered Mulciber.

"Scion of the House of Mulciber, I do say," said Severus.

"Mulciber, go get a carriage, and shut your gob," Lucius Malfoy had arrived. "Well met, heir of the Noble House Prince."

"Well met, heir of the Noble and Ancient House Malfoy," returned Severus.

"Listen, you firsties," said Lucius. "I almost followed the dark lord until it was shown to me that he was a loser. And the reason I nearly followed him was because it sickened me to see the ways and traditions of my world being taken over and supplanted by those from a different background. He promises that the traditions will be observed, but I know that he is a blood liar. He is a half-blood who claims to be a pure blood. I do not disrespect half-bloods," he added hastily. "It is the lying which I disparage. I … have learned much and I pledge to protect any … muggleborn," the pause was scarcely perceptible, "… who come into House Slytherin. But I will require you to learn proper etiquette."

"Well spoken, Malfoy," said Severus, quietly. "Truce?"

"I think we are both on the same side," said Malfoy. "Truce."

OoOoOo

The Marauders and Regulus had a carriage to themselves and this time they knew enough to ward the door with runes and spells, or at least, Severus, Remus and Lily did.

"Any news we need to know?" asked Severus. Naturally all his friends had been apprised of how Dumbledore was indisposed and Tiberius would take his place for a year.

"Yeah, I learned a lot about geomancy off my dad over the hols," said Sirius. "And I did my own researching in the library. I reckon I can make a map of Hogwarts now, and if I can get you to add some runes from the ward stones to it, we can have the location of everyone in the castle revealed. And as your grandfather is the head, and has legitimate right to view the wards it might even mean that we won't need the nefarious subverting of house elves to do so."

"It's for fighting the followers of Riddle, so I can't see that he would object," said Severus. "We've destroyed two horcruces for certain and probably a third. I think we should work on the possibility of there being six, but I'm inclined to think that four will probably do it."

"If it doesn't, Sev mate, when we've killed him we'll just have to destroy the others and kill him again until he stays dead," said James.

"Not something to regard with philosophy but it does remain an option as plan b," said Severus, dryly.

Peter spoke up.

"Sev, I'm no end grateful to your grandfather for marking Mum and me as your family, and seeing she has a nice house and an elf to care for her while I'm at school, but we now live near Cherry, and she and I have been talking. And we … we support what you do, and … and will always keep _cave_ , but …." He floundered.

"Peter and I want to resign from being full time Marauders," said Charity. "We will swear any oath of silence you want us to, but we … we're scared about taking on Death Eaters for real, and seeking for horcruces."

"I see." Severus filled in the stunned silence, motioning to James as James opened his mouth with a furious look on his face. "We appreciate that you have the bravery to tell us rather than just holding back. It's a hard task we've set ourselves and not one we can ask anyone to accept if it frightens them. We formed a group for mutual protection and particularly to protect Remus and your aid in protecting him will never be forgotten."

"Nor how you helped me, Peter," said Narcissa.

"We … we'd be honoured to help with anything like the werewolf hair jape" said Charity. "That was so funny."

They all grinned, remembering how everyone in the school had been made to grow hair on the full moon.

"We won't stop being friends with you," said Severus. "But as we do have serious stuff to discuss, it might be as well if you went to find Alice Oakby and Frank Longbottom."

Peter looked torn between relief and looking as though he was about to burst into tears. Lily gave him a hug, and Petunia followed suit, as did Myrtle and Severus shook his hand, as did Remus, followed by Phil. James and Sirius did so, but it was reluctant. Charity had the same hugs from the girls and hugged all the boys, and the pair withdrew.

"Little traitor!" burst out James, when they were out of earshot.

"If he was a traitor he'd not have said anything but would have blabbed to Mulciber or Rab Lestrange," said Severus.

"How do you know he won't?"

"Because he's a friend, and loyal to us," said Severus, "And while we continue to treat him as a friend and respect that he's not as foolhardy as the rest of us, he won't have any urges to do so. Honestly, James, he should have been in Hufflepuff, he only ended up with us in Gryffindor to be with the people he saw as those who saved his tail from Malfoy and his friends. You said standing up to them was brave enough for Gryffindor as I recall. And he wanted to be brave. I think it was courageous of him to admit to not having enough courage to carry on with us. And really, would you want someone who might freeze in a group about to defy the darkest wizard since Grindelwald? Because I think they'd risk getting us killed by accident if they don't feel able to face out Death Eaters. And I'd rather carry on being friends with them and not having that happen because if Peter, say, froze, and one of my friends died because of it, I'd have a hard time forgiving him. As it is, I can say kudos to him for knowing his limitations."

"You're right, Sev, mate," Sirius nodded. "I was furious, like James, but … there are reasons we haven't invited in Frank or Alice. And Peter is more like them, law-abiding and a bit stuffy."

"I … yeah, I suppose you're right," said James.

"On the up side we are back to an arithmantically significant ten, with Myrtle and Regulus," said Lily. "Ten for rebirth and the singularity for uniqueness when it reduces arithmantically to one. All for one and one for all as you might say."

"I don't even know what horcruces are that scare them so much," said Regulus, "But I won't chicken out."

"No, you're my brother and a member of the family Black, which may be darker than the digestive organs of a Death Eater, but it doesn't shirk duty," said Sirius. "And Peter and Cherry don't have that sort of upbringing, to stand by duty. I guess it's not their fault."

"Nor do we," said Petunia.

"No, sweet flower, but you and your sister are exceptional; and Remus has already faced darkness since his early life," said Sirius.

Lily raised an eyebrow.

"Was that courtship talk, calling my sister sweet flower?" she asked. Sirius blushed. So did Petunia.

"It seemed a good name at the time," he said.

"Well as Petunia and Lily are my sisters, I will expect to be consulted by anyone who plans to court them, and anyone who misbehaves without declaring intention to court will have me to face," said Severus.

"Understood," said Sirius.

"Ugh, I can't believe you people are old enough to even think of being so icky," said Regulus.

"I'm not sure I am, but let's leave that for now, while I explain a few things to you," said Severus. Regulus was soon filled in on horcruces, and what a loser Tom Riddle was. He nodded, thoughtfully.

"It seems to me that as Cousin Narcissa is getting elderly, it might not be a bad idea if I go into Slytherin, as Mother wanted, to keep an eye on things. You say Greengrasse has a gang, I can run with that to keep myself safer, and Narcissa will be around for a couple of years. You need more eyes in the house."

"I'll be in the fourth, a year below Phil, but we ought to look out for younger Ravenclaws too," said Myrtle. "Charity will presumably let us know if anything untoward is going on, but can anyone seriously see Death Eaters arising from Hufflepuff House? It's so unbadger-like."

This raised a laugh. Hufflepuffs were known for a level of loyalty to each other in house as well as out, unlike Slytherin, who stood together as a rule outside house, and devised ways to back stab each other on the other side of their pass-warded door.

"And Ravenclaws have a lot of traditional and pure blooded members," said James. "Like Farty Fenwick and Cloudy Passwater."

"Your opprobrious nicknames for Ferdinand Fenwick and Claude Clearwater aside, it's calling them that in public which makes them remember that they are pure bloods who believe in etiquette," said Lily, severely. "They are pompous ticks of the first water, but try not to make them more susceptible to choosing Riddle over staying neutrally academic pompous ticks. I've spoken to you about this before."

"Yes, oh mistress of the blue horizons," said James. "I promise not to mock them in public, and remind myself that I scarcely have to do so, since they manage to make themselves look like both asses and arses the moment they open their mouths, especially with Sev there to baffle them with brilliance and bewilder them with bullshit … sorry ladies, apologies."

"I don't think he's ever going to outgrow having a potty mouth," sighed Lily. "Even if he does acknowledge me as 'She Who Must Be Obeyed', and I never thought of you as reading muggle fiction like Rider Haggard."

"I doubt I will outgrow it, but you all love me anyway, don't you?" said James. "And muggles have some jolly good fiction. I got it from 'Rumpole of the Bailey', actually, because it's what he calls his wife."

"Are you proposing at our age?" demanded Lily."

"You do want to marry me when we grow up, don't you?" said James. "And something for everyone, an alliance between House Potter and House Prince will please the old folk too. And like I said, I _am_ lovable."

"Ask me again after our OWLs," said Lily, with a toss of her head. She looked pleased, before she lowered her eyes.

Severus rolled his eyes.

"Fortunately for you, James, we do all love you, or I'd have to be a scary brother at someone chatting up my sister," he said. "Regulus, I take it by your suggestion of going into Slytherin as our eyes there in the junior school that you accept the onerous task of destroying horcruces?"

Regulus regarded him steadily.

"I won't pretend to be anything but afraid," he said, "But it has to be done, and the Founder is for it, and if we need someone who can flit about, we have a family house elf who is personally loyal to me, because he's been treated really badly by Mother, and doesn't know enough not to adore her anyway."

"Is that why Kreacher is so awful to me, because Mother doesn't like me?" asked Sirius.

"And you yell at him. He's a poor, damaged creature, you know," said Regulus.

"I read an article on that in a muggle paper once," said Petunia. "It can happen with abused children and battered wives, and they love their abuser no matter what. Mummy was trying to find out if that was why Aunt Eileen stayed with Tobias Snape."*

"Not knowing that divorce is frowned on in the Wizarding World of course," said Severus. "That was when you didn't like Lily and me."

"I was interested to see if I could find a way to have you shown up as mental," admitted Petunia. "But you and Aunt Eileen didn't fit it."

"I did at first, I tried so hard to please my father," said Severus, softly. "But I moved on. Thanks, Petunia, that will help us understand Kreacher."

 **Chapter 3**

Regulus went off with the other firsties to cross the lake by boat, and the rest of the Marauders climbed into the horseless carriages. Myrtle gasped.

"What are those skeletal horses drawing the carriages?" she demanded.

"Thestrals," said Phil. "You can only see them when you have seen death; or happen to have enough fae blood to see something of the invisible. I can't see them properly, but when I was in the second year, I looked them up."

Severus shuddered.

"Somehow I suspect it won't be long before we all see them," he said. "I'm glad Peter and Charity are out of the Marauders. I think they are too gentle for that."

"And it's our job as Marauders to make sure the gentle people get through school without seeing thestrals," said James. "I made a prat of myself almost losing my rag. I must do something nice for Pete."

"Be friendly to him in the common room and dorm so he knows you got over being pissed; he did see your face," said Severus.

James nodded.

"I'll apologise that I had a moment's misunderstanding," said James.

"What I like about you, James," said Lily, "Is that when you know you've been a prat, you're fair enough to admit to it and go all out to make amends."

"Thanks. I think," said James. Lily smiled at him and touched his arm.

"It was meant as a compliment," she said.

OoOoOo

Peter was really looking pleased because for James, to think was to act, and he had spoken to the former Marauder as they were going to their House tables, and drew Peter to sit next to him. Peter really admired James and the other boy's kindness meant a lot to him. That Severus had always been kind to him meant he would feel no awkwardness when his mother had spent some time recuperating at the seaside in Devon, and moved in with the Prince family. Tiberius Prince had provided Madam Pettigrew with some strengthening potions which they could never have afforded, and Peter hoped that she might make a full recovery. Peter was as happy as it was possible to be, especially as all the Marauders accepted his decision to keep himself safer for his mother. He told James so, and James, flushing at how crass he had almost been, slapped him on the shoulder.

"A chap has to look out for his mum," he said, gruffly. James was the child of his own parents' later years, and he valued them, but he knew that they would want him to do what was right. He had always got the impression that Peter's mother leaned on Peter rather, and that had to alter a fellow's perspective rather, and keep him from following his own inclinations. He felt more kindly towards Peter and smiled at him.

"You can depend on me for … well, less challenging things," said Peter, eagerly.

"Yeah, mate, I know; you're a good friend," said James. Peter's cup ran over.

Around them there were whispers over where the headmaster was, why his throne-like chair had disappeared, and why the DADA professor was sat in the place it had been. It was a reasonably easy guess that the handsome ebony-skinned man at the staff table was the new DADA teacher.

Tiberius rose and rapped on the table for silence. When he did not get it immediately, his second rap on the table was felt, quite literally, by everyone as it shocked through the hall like a small earthquake.

"Are you really such an ill-disciplined rabble as not to shut the hell up when a professor calls for silence?" demanded Tiberius. "Before we hat the firsties, I am going to tell you the news, so that the ceremony of choosing houses is not interrupted by the sort of idle speculation so horribly rife in the school, such that one might think you all to be the sorts of half-educated witches who go to dame schools and believe that Fifi LaFolle writes true stories."

"Snide," muttered McGonagall.

Tiberius grinned at her wolfishly.

 _You chose me to be headmaster_ he thrust the words into her mind. She managed not to jump.

He spoke out loud.

"Professor Dumbledore has suffered an indisposition. I'm afraid in Gryffindorish zeal he managed to cause a magical accident which will leave him weakened for the year round or more. He is hoping to resume his duties next year in the fond belief that he will have regained some of his physical strength; and nobody will notice if his faculties are more diminished than usual."

"Tiberius!" Minerva McGonagall was moved to protest. He grinned again.

"Just to warn you all, I will not be favouring Gryffindor House. Neither will I be favouring Slytherin, from whence I come. Oh, and the other staff change is that Auror Shacklebolt will be joining us for the first half of the year as DADA teacher. He's forgotten more about the dark arts than most Death Eaters ever learned and has killed more dark wizards than most of you have had hot dinners. Now I hand you over to the hat."

The hat sang,

" _Oh I may not look very much_

 _In fact I'm old and battered,_

 _But don't rely on looks and such_

 _As if such really mattered._

 _When darkness stalks throughout the land_

 _And everyone is fearful_

 _And many need a helping hand_

 _To get through times so tearful_

 _Then bear in mind the mighty truth_

 _That all the founders puissant_

 _Were close and loving friends in sooth_

 _And thus let this be reasoned:_

 _Co-operation of each House_

 _Is needed for succeeding_

 _When heroes grow and powers arouse_

 _That they not be left bleeding._

 _So let your friendships not rely_

 _On House and on House only_

 _But seek outside and draw more nigh_

 _And let no-one be lonely!"_

"Well that was clear enough," said Severus to his cronies. "Despite the odd dodgy rhyme."

"And also suggests we should be looking out for the kids who have no friends, regardless of House," said Lily.

"No more nargle attacks on loners," nodded Severus. "Fenwick has no friends but that is one he did bring on himself by making sure everyone knew how great he was, and actually I so am looking forward to outstripping him in arithmancy that he boasts he has had private tuition in."

"Not in the spirit of the hat's song," scolded Lily.

"Yeah, but beats jinxing him like I want to do," said James.

"Hush, there's my brother," said Sirius.

Regulus sat under the hat for a very, very long time. The boy wore a very serious look on his face, and nodded once or twice. The hat finally pronounced,

"Hufflepuff!"

Sirius gasped.

Regulus gave his brother a shaky grin and a thumb's up sign as he headed for the Hufflepuff table where the cheers were at best dubious, except from Charity.

"He was thinking of his duty to the group and us having lost Charity," groaned Sirius. "Mum is going to kill him!"

"Is that a literal possibility?" Severus asked, concerned. His grandfather had filled him in on the rather dark nature of many of the Black family.

"I wouldn't put it past her, she whipped me for being Gryffindor and tried to get Dumbledore to have my house changed," groaned Sirius.

"Then listen to me, and get a letter written right away," said Severus, urgently. "Write and tell your mother and father how clever Reg was to infiltrate Hufflepuff to teach pure blooded values to them, after seeing how successfully you have got Gryffindor following your lead in protocols."

"It's your lead, and I was following it, Sev, mate," said Sirius.

"I don't care about that! You have to grow up with this crazy mother of yours and so does your brother. Keep him safe! Let her think he's done a Slytherin sort of thing and that you did so too, but didn't want to tell her as she didn't want to listen."

"Crumbs, Sev, mate, you're bloody brilliant," said Sirius. "Bring me some food later, I'll slope off and do that now in case she has any spies in Slytherin House who will gloat over Reg's supposed disgrace."

Severus patted his friend's arm and let him go. It might be paranoid, but with crazy witches like Walburga Black, paranoid wasn't scared enough.

Meanwhile there was no surprise when Myrtle Prince, a transfer entering the fourth year, hatted into Ravenclaw.

OoOoOo

The hatting was completed, and the feast commenced. And the Black family owl swooped in and aimed majestically for the Hufflepuff table. Regulus paled. However, the envelope was not the red envelope of a Howler, so he quickly opened it.

" _My dear son,_

 _Sirius has told me how cunning you have been to try to impose order on a House which sorely needs it. You will have to be circumspect at first, as I am sure you are aware, working with those who are your own age and leading them, as of course any Black will manage to do. Please pass to Sirius my regards and tell him he deserved punishment for failing to explain what he was attempting to do. I am pleased that he has succeeded. I wish you every luck._

 _Your mother,_

 _Walburga Black_

 _Lady of the Noble and Ancient House of Black."_

Regulus breathed out, a long sigh. He felt sick and shaky.

"Are you alright, mate?" another firstie said.

"Yes, thank you," said Regulus. "My brother got me off the hook for sorting into this House."

"What's wrong with Hufflepuff?" demanded the lad.

"Nothing except from my parents' point of view. My family go into Slytherin as a general thing."

"I wouldn't want to go there, they look snooty."

"It's called preserving a mask," said Regulus. "It's about the etiquette all people of old wizarding background learn. You're muggleborn, aren't you?"

"What of it?"

Regulus remembered all Sirius had told him.

"Well, how would you like a wizard to move in next to your mum and dad and point and laugh because they go to work in a car not on a broom, and make comments about how they look because they don't wear robes or wizarding hats, and make assumptions that your mum is a scarlet woman because she might wear a … a mini skirt?" he said.

"I'd punch out his daylights," said the boy.

"Well, my friend, how different is that to a muggleborn living in the wizarding world thinking that it's fine to ignore our etiquette and ways of doing things, and insisting on the muggle way being the only way?" said Regulus. "If you go to visit France, you learn some French, even if it's only 'please' and 'thank you'. If you live in another country, you need to learn the language of the place where you live."

The boy considered this, then nodded.

"Fair's fair," he said, thrusting out a hand. "Adam Flanders."

Regulus shook it.

"Regulus Black, younger son of the House Black," he said, deciding to discard the 'Noble and Ancient' for the time being.

"You are formal."

"Actually I was being rather informal for the House of Black, Mr. Flanders."

"Er, you can call me Adam."

"Thank you for your permission, Adam. You may call me Regulus or Reg."

"Bloody hell!"

Regulus frowned.

"Language, Adam; there are ladies present. In the wizarding world we try to protect our womenfolk. There are those who need protecting like a dragon needs protecting, but we do actually have laws to protect dragons as well, and it's a matter of respect, even if it was my cousin, Bellatrix."

"What is it about your cousin, then?"

"She's a Death Eater; follows the dark lord," said Regulus. "So if I had to kill her, I'd be required by etiquette to say 'excuse me' first."

Adam roared with laughter.

"That's ludicrous."

"Where my cousin is concerned, actually, yes, but it really is proper to be polite to girls and ladies. Hush, the head is going to speak."

Tiberius had banged on the table again and got instant silence.

"That's better," he said. "I want to welcome you all properly, now you've assuaged most of your hunger, and to let everyone know, especially the new ones, that Sunday mornings will be given over to training in wizarding etiquette for those who have received no or little instruction. It is not compulsory, but I would advise attendance. The hat has called for co-operation between the Houses, and that means that if you know the correct way to approach a member of another House which uses more formality, there should be fewer misunderstandings. Now please disperse to your common rooms, prefects in your own Houses will show you about."

Regulus found himself in the cosy common room of the Hufflepuffs, and a prefect smiled at him.

"I heard your explanation about etiquette to young Adam, and I am hoping that you will repeat it. Here we have no rank save accepting that Prefects do know what they are talking about, but I think it should be repeated to Badger confab," she said.

"Yes, ma'am," said Regulus. He had a sudden revelation that these Hufflepuffs would welcome openness. He cleared his throat as dozens of eyes looked curiously at him. "My brother and his gang are mostly Gryffindors, but they have members from other houses and they are trying to help interhouse co-operations. And I thought as they have no Hufflepuffs, I should be in Hufflepuff house. My brother was flogged by our mother for being a Gryffindor, and I was well scared, even though I knew choosing this House was right." There were gasps of horror and Regulus knew he had their support, especially kindly-looking Professor Sprout who looked nauseated. "And my clever brother told our mother that I had infiltrated in order to teach etiquette. Adam asked me about it." He repeated his explanation to Adam, and many of those with one muggle parent, or muggleborn were nodding as he pointed out how such rudeness from a single wizard would affect them, shocked that their belief that they were already courteous was taken the same way.

"Hufflepuff House has never been as formal as some Houses," said Madam Sprout, "But Professor Prince has explained how the way that etiquette has fallen into disuse in the last couple of generations has outraged some older families, and made them turn to the dark lord. As one would have expected the Noble and Ancient House of Black to be amongst their number, I want to say, Mr. Black, how loyal and dutiful you are to the Wizarding World to break with tradition of your family to help nurture better bonds of friendship between Houses. I strongly urge my badgers to attend the Sunday classes, even if you choose to discard some of the more archaic rituals."

"I am happy for all my housemates and my esteemed House Head to use my given name," said Regulus with a bow.

"I think you'll find most of us heave a sigh of relief as we tend to use each other's given names as a matter of course. Louise Crow," the prefect introduced herself. Regulus bowed beautifully and kissed her hand punctiliously. Several badgers giggled.

Louise flushed.

"A few people here could definitely learn a few lessons in how to treat a lady," she said. A male prefect did his best to emulate Regulus.

"At your command, my lady," he said.

She sighed, and took his hand.

"If you were half serious, I'd be swooning," she said.

"I'll go to the classes and take notes."

 **Chapter 4**

Myrtle found she had a harder time.

"So why did you suddenly decide to come to school at fourteen?" demanded another girl.

"Well met. My name is Myrtle Prince. To whom am I speaking?" asked Myrtle, with a slight inclination of the head. The other girl flushed.

"Well met, Miss Prince. I am Amabilia Brocklehurst."

Myrtle smiled.

"You are also not very good at checking your facts, which is not very good in a Ravenclaw."

Brocklehurst flushed and scowled.

"What do you mean?"

"Is it not clear? Your first question to me, unintroduced, included a fallacy in your assumption. Perhaps you would like to rethink your query."

"I can't see a fallacy in asking why you suddenly decided to come to school to join the fourth year," said Brocklehurst.

"Miss Brocklehurst, you are assuming I have not been at school before. Which is the fallacy."

"Oh. Well where were you at school before?"

 _The past is a different country_ thought Myrtle.

"In another country, where I lived with my parents," she said. "Tragic circumstances and family death have led to me living with my great grandfather. Hence, I go to school with my cousin, Severus Prince. I had to go over my sad past to satisfy a nosy little girl why?"

Brocklehurst flushed darker.

"We have a right to know whether you will cost us house points for being less well prepared," she whined.

"I was offered the fifth form on my knowledge and decided to decline, at least for now, because I have covered more than you," said Myrtle. Whilst ghosts tended to be stuck in the 'now' of their death, Myrtle had managed to pick up some of what she had heard other students talking about, and being a Ravenclaw at heart had been consolidating that during the holidays. "I was planning on taking two or three OWLs a year early, unless I work hard enough to get a total remove," she said. "Which I might do if you are a sample of my year mates."

"Stuck up cow," muttered Brocklehurst.

"How plebian," said Myrtle, hiding a giggle, having been the plebian one when she was in Ravenclaw the first time, and bullied for not knowing the forms of etiquette and protocol. She would see that the new intake learned properly, and would make sure none of them were bullied.

OoOoOo

Narcissa was surprised to see Lucius come forward to greet the first years too.

"Are we actually on the same mission here?" she asked.

"To help the two … muggleborn … settle in? yes," said Lucius.

"You've improved a lot," said Narcissa.

"I grew up some," admitted Lucius. "Just because Professor Prince can cure squibs doesn't mean that he isn't right that purebloods might be a bit inbred. The madness of the Gaunts demonstrates that, and the fact that Malfoys rarely manage more than one child. I know my father is a bit hidebound, but I'm thinking of marrying a muggleborn to see if I can't do something about that."

Narcissa almost gave an unladylike whistle of surprise.

"Good for you, Malfoy," she said. "I'm considering a pureblood but of an obscure family."

"Probably wise. Half the Black family are barking," said Lucius.

"Alas, I have to agree. My sister, Andromeda, however, is very happy, and has a baby girl who is already a metamorphagus. Though what possessed Andi to call the poor brat 'Nymphadora' defeats my poor brain."

Lucius laughed.

"Well if that's the worst expression of the Black madness in her, I suppose it could be worse. Call the brat Dora or Phaedra."

"Yes, good idea. Will you open the speech to the little ones?"

Lucius nodded.

"Right, you firsties, I am sure that those of you from families who traditionally go into Slytherin House already know the protocols. We are a traditional House here, and that does mean that you bow or curtsey to me or Miss Black here when you encounter us unless given permission to pass on that privilege to our lineage, also to Mr. Greengrasse in the second year, whose house is also Noble and Ancient. Just to be sure you do things properly the same protocols should be observed to others of Noble and Ancient lines, and Miss Black and I will post a list of those in other houses accorded this status. Not all Houses follow the protocols but there will be no exceptions from this House as we count it as a victory when we surprise the hell out of them. It's a small rivalry which does not, or should not, lead to major problems. The headmaster has offered classes in etiquette, and all firsties will attend, and anyone higher up the school who feels uncertain in their knowledge. The reason for the ascendancy of the so-called and self-styled Dark Lord, a half-blood named Tom Riddle, is his offer to restore order and expressions of respect. We purebloods have become somewhat inbred, because of certain false assumptions we have made, and we need to get a life and realise it, thank you, Miss Black," as Narcissa neatly cast a shield charm to deflect the hex Rabastan Lestrange was casting, and bound him securely, wandlessly and with only the mouthed incantation with a twist of her left hand.

"You're welcome," said Narcissa. "Some purebloods like Mr. Lestrange are just losers who follow the loser, Tom Riddle."

"Please, why is he a loser?" asked one of the firsties.

"Ah, Leodegas Burke, isn't it?" said Lucius. "He's a loser because he relies on dark magic, and takes short cuts, rather than becoming pre-eminent in magic by the standard route. It is possible to force more power out of a spell by the use of rather messy methods, but ultimately it is not as powerful as learning slower, more certain, but more difficult methods. He's also insane."

"I think you need to know more about why he's insane, actually, Lucius," said Narcissa. "I'll tell you when there are no little pitchers to give nightmares to, regarding what he has done."

Lucius' eyebrows went up.

"Very well," he said. "Anyway, Mr. Burke, I hope that clarifies the matter; you will doubtless learn more in your DADA classes if the new professor is any good. If not, go and ask the headmaster. The Loser, which is a good name for Riddle, or maybe Lord Losealot, has been lying about his own blood status to get purebloods to follow him to regain their status in the wizarding world, which they feel has been eroded by half-bloods and muggleborn, because of our low birthrate, and the higher chance of producing squibs. His promises are as much a lie as his blood status. I'd respect him more if he had been honest, but that's by the by. In the meantime, we will be testing all of you who are half blood, muggleborn or low status and if you learn the protocols well, and do not let House Slytherin down, there will be adoptions available into various great houses, as subsidiary members. This will affect your employment chances as well, so be aware. Anything else, Cissy?"

"Actually I think you summed it up pretty well, Lucius," said Narcissa. "I am glad to see you prepared to consider familial adoption. I don't think the Lestranges are likely to be doing so, however. Not all the firsties actually are aware of what a concession that was, but I'm sure Mr. Burke will explain."

Leodegas Burke was nodding, his eyes having gone wide.

"Good." Narcissa smiled. "If you have any problems, come to me or to Lucius; or to Mr. Greengrasse and his gang in the second. And if you want to be a little Death Eater, don't expect any support from any of us unless you want to get yourself out of it, like Mr. Avery, who has my respect."

Avery flushed.

"My family isn't Noble, but it is Ancient," he said. "And by the time I'm seventeen I expect I will have lost a lot of family and will be glad of adopting others. I don't think my father would be doing any adopting in the meantime."

"You have plenty of safe havens, I assure you, Mr. Avery," said Lucius.

They had left the first year with much to think about.

OoOoOo

Lucius swore for several minutes without stopping when Narcissa explained about horcruces.

"Sorry," he said.

"I'm aware your family is horsy and you're about the last descendant of the Withers family, so the language of the stable was no surprise. It was the descent into Troll which made me blush," said Narcissa.

Lucius looked uncomfortable.

"I AM sorry," he said.

"Apology duly accepted," said Narcissa. "I take it this only strengthens your resolve to go against Lord Losealot, which title, by the way, I really like."

"It does," said Lucius, grimly.

"I'll let the other Marauders know," said Narcissa. "We've destroyed three so far."

Lucius stared.

"Really?"

"We definitely destroyed two, though one of those was done by Professor Prince in the holidays, and we are ninety percent certain we destroyed the other, but the ritual was a bit untried," said Narcissa. "It's not really a secret I can talk about."

"Since when did you start monkeying with ritual? That's not even in NEWTs, or only mentioned," said Lucius. Narcissa chuckled.

"Since I became friendly with the adopted muggleborn of the Prince family and young Severus, and discovered that Severus is more aware of ritual than I wager most people in the Ministry are," she said.

OoOoOo

The new Gryffindors were less amenable to ideas like protocol.

"Why should we follow some outmoded and poncy ideas?" demanded one firstie.

"How about so you don't actually lose house points for being rude to people?" said James. "Really, kid, have you any idea what a common little brat you sound? Like some of the muggles in the poorer parts of London where the poor little sods have both parents out at work who can't give them time to bring them up properly."

"I'm a muggleborn from the East End and my ma would skelp me if I was so rude as that," said another child, a diminutive blond boy. "I don't know where MacLaggan was dragged up but I'd be ashamed to have his mouth. He's been swearing since we got on the train."

"Even in front of girls?" Severus was shocked. "Here, MacLaggan, if I catch you swearing in front of girls, I'll wash your dirty mouth out."

"Sez who, you feckin' bastard …wwwyeeebleble," said MacLaggan as Severus pulled off a non-verbal ' _saponify'_ spell. He had been practising in order to catch Peeves off guard, but it came in well for dirty-mouthed brats as well.

"I hope you will not call me that when you are old enough for my legal adviser to sue you for slander; my parents were married," said Severus, coldly. "Name calling has consequences, little boy. I am sorry for your parents."

The first year Gryffindor girls applauded. If McClaggan was against protocol, suddenly they were in favour.

Xxx

Severus was in fourth year runes this year, and as it was a small class, it was an all-Houses elective. He grinned at Myrtle, who was also in the class, having caught up in a hurry to add it to her electives.

The other Ravenclaws scowled at him as they had done the year before, having hoped that the jumped-up Gryffindork would have dropped out by now. Severus secretly wished that he had asked the Hat for Ravenclaw not Gryffindor, but at least he had his friends, and the ruder elements need not bother him. It would never have occurred to him to go into Gryffindor had not his friends gone there, making it a second choice after he decided to opt out of Slytherin. Narcissa was no longer welcome in the Gryffindor common room because the Prewetts were pains in the arse, even though they did preserve strict protocol to those who preferred it. And now Lucius Malfoy was an ally. Life was odd. Allies and those who were not friendly, even if not enemies, seemed a fluid business. It was probably about what his mother called 'hormones'. Presumably Malfoy was old enough to have got rid of his hormones, whatever they were.

xxx

Leroy Jethro Shacklebolt was a man whose eyes missed nothing and Fester Crabbe and Dione Bulstrode were in detention for passing notes within moments of the class starting.

"Before I was interrupted I was introducing myself. I am a retired auror, and that means I'm still capable of taking on most dark wizards. I'm retired because I am losing my edge and that risks my team. Old age does that, and for an auror, old age comes at about forty, even for a wizard. There are old aurors and bold aurors, but very few where the two coincide. Don't get me wrong; a coward can't be an auror. But a good auror also knows when to leave a fight in order to get information back. The message I'm trying to give you is that sometimes running away is the proper course of action. I know that won't sit well with some Gryffindors!"

"You should never run from a righteous fight, my dad says!" Ignatius Weasley piped up.

"Even if running means you can take vital information to take down an enemy rather than dying nobly before you can pass it on?" said Severus, sarcastically.

"It's still better to die a brave man than live a coward," said Weasley, stubbornly.

"Wrong, Mr. Weasley," said Shacklebolt. "It's better to live a sensible man than to die an idiot."

Weasley went red.

"With respect, sir, which house were you in?" he asked.

"Gryffindor, and it took me time to learn," said Shacklebolt. "My best student is a young man called Alastor Moody, who was a Slytherin. He looks before he leaps and he mistrusts everyone, especially other Slytherin."

"He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day," said Sirius. "It goes against the grain, sir, but we Gryffs are lions, and unless he has cubs to protect, you don't actually see a lion risking himself stupidly, he drives a threat off while making a strategic retreat with his pride."

"Ten marks to Gryffindor, an excellent piece of reasoning and well put," said Shacklebolt. "Now, I'm not going to be teaching you solely how to run away; but I am going to be teaching you defences before I teach you offensive spells, and make sure that you can all hold the shield charm before we move on. I'll be putting you into role-play scenarios as well, to discuss what would be the proper thing to do in given situations, and then I'll start setting up situations where you can act out real things that have happened. I have set up a room in wizarding space off this room for that purpose, which will recreate the scenery I want within it."

The Marauders considered the forthcoming curriculum to be very promising, and Severus hoped that his mother would continue with it.

He was unaware that his mother was travelling around the muggleborn who would be entering Hogwarts in the following three years, explaining about magic and arranging for them to attend classes in which they would learn about the wizarding world and about the protocols, which would start them off at less of a disadvantage than had happened hitherto. The classes were to be run by Andromeda Tonks, who knew both worlds.

 **Chapter 5**

"Tiberius, you know that Albus will rescind all your orders regarding etiquette lessons and celebrating Samhain and Yule not Halloween and Christmas, don't you?" Minerva McGonagall said to Tiberius Prince.

Tiberius smiled.

"He is following a mugglisation of the Wizarding World started by Armando Dippet, which is the direct cause of the rise of Tom Riddle as Lord Losealot, as I understand he has been dubbed in the school. We expect to blend in with muggles if we live and work in their world, and I don't see why we should have to change our ways for their convenience in ours. It's a shame the Weasleys and Prewetts, decent enough people in their own way, I'm sure, are such disciples of his, as they make your house a laughing stock."

McGonagall reddened.

"Mr. Weasley's behaviour has not been exactly exemplary, and I can see Mr. Prewett's reaction to his girlfriend being a Parselmouth might be a little extreme, but …"

"A little extreme? It was out of all proportion. Miss Black is a talented young lady to have learned it so well. However, she is well shot of such a bigoted youth."

"Well, teenage love rarely runs smoothly, and you are evading the question."

"I wasn't evading the question. I was merely going through the reasons I want to reinstitute the customs in case you were too enamoured of all that Albus has done."

"Being agnostic, I don't much care which names or ceremonies are used."

"Then you don't mind insulting those who prefer the old ways by appearing to pander to the largely, if nominally, Christian incomers? I was planning on going further, in having a small chapel built, and a muggle-born chaplain employed for those who were of the Christian persuasion, and leaving everyone else to comply with whatever tradition they will. We shall not be celebrating either the Christian Misrule or the Roman Saturnalia at all. It's never been celebrated for a very good reason."

"Well I certainly agree with you on that; having a Lord of Misrule appointed by chance and the staff acting like house elves is not suitable."

"Especially since, if we adhered to Saturnalia, the elves would be waited on by everyone. They'd hate it."

Minerva shuddered.

"They'd a' accept clothes for being sair affronted," she said, her accent showing more in emotion.

"Quite. However, if I make sure that the Christians have a place to go, they'll be less likely to interfere with the various flavours of pagans, pantheists and other religions in the school, and the old Celtic celebrations a signal that all are welcome. I'm not about to introduce Ramadan or Divali or Chanukah or anything else either, but private celebrations of religion are down to the individual. And as to how we avoid the old idiot from ruining the chance to make integration of muggleborns easier, I'll tell you."

"His plan was to help muggleborn."

"But it doesn't. It only makes those of older families resent them, and gets them locked out of any meaningful jobs in our political body, because nobody trusts them not to try to undo everything. Much is wrong in our world, and the muggleborn, especially if egged on by Albus, want to tear down the good with the bad and rebuild in their own idea of good. Change has to come from within."

"I see what you are saying. Albus does mean well."

"Albus means well, I am sure, but he has the political subtlety of a troll on alihotsy, manipulations notwithstanding."

"What do you mean?"

"Minerva, you do realise that he accepted Remus Lupin into the school with the intent that the boy would be isolated, with only Albus to turn to, so that he could talk him into spying on the dark lord, who would assume the boy's werewolf status would make him dark. He was not best pleased that Remus made friends and was even less pleased that I found a cure."

Minerva paled.

"I did not want to think it of him …."

"No, I know, which is why I have spelled it out for you. However, his own hubris will keep him out of the school, with that cursed hand of his. I have prevented the curse from killing him, but in order to feed the runes I used, the man's magical core will be gradually drained."

"Tiberius!"

"Are you thinking I did it because I chose to? I did not. I could choose to slow it so that he had perhaps a year to live, or I could halt the wasting entirely at the expense of his magic."

"I see. Did you tell him?"

"Are you insane? If I'd told him, he'd have told me to halt it and give him a year of life, during which time he would have gone against Tom Riddle, dragging in his disciples and getting them killed unnecessarily before all the horcruces were destroyed."

"Horcruces?" Minerva was shocked, and Tiberius sighed and explained, irritated again with Albus Dumbeldore for not sharing the information. She was somewhat less irritated now by Tiberius Prince's actions regarding Dumbledore's cursed hand.

It should be almost the year before Dumbledore realised that his magical core was being drained, and that it was nothing to do with residual weakness from the curse, by which time he would be sufficiently weakened not to be a threat. And if he chose to sit in the Wizgamot to make waves, Abraxus Malfoy would challenge him as having no more ability to be Supreme Mugwump than had a squib. Albus would be angry, but Tiberius would shrug and tell the old fool that he had begged Tiberius to save his life, and Tiberius had done his best, risking the possibility of the runes needing to be reinforced during the first course of the curse. Be careful what you ask for, old man; you might get it.

OoOoOo

The etiquette classes were held outside as the weather was still fine, and were full of eager first years, and quite a few older children. Many of them were Hufflepuffs, but there was a distinct lack of Gryffindors, beyond a studious boy in the fourth year, who had confided to the Marauders that it was difficult to be expected to get on in a world where you knew you were an outsider, and if he could get the chance to show his worth before something in his speech mode gave him away as an outsider, he thought he might have a better chance of a job.

"Especially when we find out which family is the most appropriate one to give you familial adoption," said Severus. "What, you think you muggleborn are the only ones to have heard of Crick and Watson, and to be aware that hidden expressions of heritance?" as the boy goggled at him. "A blood test will reveal whence came the magic your parents carried, and we can organise that anyone who needs it can have familial adoption."

"I'm happy with my parents, I don't want to be adopted!" he was angry.

"You misunderstand. Your parents would be subject to adoption too, on a lower level, but as members of a family, as you would be. If you were adopted into, say, family Potter, James wouldn't be your brother. He'd be a kind of cousin, and one day head of the family. His parents would be patrons not parents to you."

"Oh. I see, I think," said the boy. "I was furious at the idea of being taken away from my parents."

"No, that won't happen, though if you and your parents have a problem, any family you belong to would be obligated to find you guardians amongst those who are their family," Severus told him. It was a bit much when even studious and clever Gryffindors leaped to conclusions. He managed not to roll his eyes. Doubtless it had happened like that in olden days, but then, in olden days, children were sent away as pages and maids in waiting as young as seven, to a family which would give them patronage in the muggle world. Times had moved on in both worlds.

Tiberius also raised the ancient concept of adopting muggleborn as a way to help out both pure blood families to grow as well as helping the muggleborn.

"The Noble and Ancient Wizarding families are more akin to clans than families, or at least, they were. The adoption of others means a form of nepotism, in making sure that family members are placed in jobs within family-held holdings, ensuring loyalty both ways," he said. "The last hundred years has seen a ridiculous level of erosion of this co-operation, and I fear that it was caused by good intentions. A number of people who have welcomed muggleborn into society have mistakenly felt that the idea of adoption is akin to slavery, which it is not. It's not to say there have not been cases where adoptive kindred have been exploited. They have. This is equally true in the case of some muggle employers with unfair terms and contracts. The muddle-headed belief that purebloods must be made to accept muggleborn as … well, lately, under the previous headmaster as superiors, has been very damaging. Nobody likes a braggart moving into their neighbourhood and telling everyone how they are doing everything wrong! The old ways were not always well run but they were there with an intent of mutual benefit. And of course, nobody has to accept adoption. But if you have your magic from a distant cousin it seems like a good idea to acknowledge that cousin. I want to see the wizarding world grow, and blossom, and exchange ideas to bring enhancement to the lives of all. I want dialogue, not squabbling. I want … I want James Potter to run three times round the lake for whatever nefarious jinx you laid on that Ravenclaw girl you pest!" he added.

James grinned and set off.

He did not negate the grass growing jinx which was quietly growing grass up Miss Brocklehurst's spine, since the girl appeared only to have come in order to scoff.

Tiberius went on,

"The reason for protocol classes is to permit everyone to understand how to properly interact with other members of the wizarding world, including those of socially elevated rank. You wouldn't expect to go to Eton and get on well there if you didn't know how to address the son of a duke, or how to handle the cutlery covering several courses. Everywhere you go, there is a different etiquette, and I have decided to extend you the courtesy of providing you with enough etiquette to get on at every level in wizarding society. If you were at Eton, you wouldn't get that; you'd just be laughed at if you didn't know. I'm also going to be getting in a dancing master during the bad weather for third years and above, to make sure you don't feel embarrassed at the Yule Ball – or at any other society balls to which you might be invited. Dancing masters are provided for all pure blood families for their offspring, and are respected. It's another career move for anyone light on their feet. The idea that people will find a natural mix is, I'm afraid, muddleheaded, and I will also be providing a muggle parent of a muggleborn pupil to teach something about muggles to those of the wizarding family children who haven't got a clue. But not until they are assured that muggleborn can behave in a way they would expect. One day the classes will take place simultaneously, and will ensure that pureblood children can become as safe in muggle society as I hope muggleborn children will learn to be in wizarding society."

"Please, sir, why quills? Biros are neater and easier to use," asked Adam Flanders, Regulus Black's friend.

"Because the concentration needed for good penmanship is a good way of training a would-be wizard or witch to concentrate his or her mind, and in the same way that one concentrates on casting magic. Moreover, the use of purely organic implements and organic ink permits a better flow of magic. I will be having penmanship classes as well, which should help you."

"Thank you sir; it might have been nice to have had penmanship classes over the summer at least, and preferably from when my magic showed up."

"Noted, and I'll be passing that on, since we plan to contact muggleborn as soon as their magic shows from now on," said Tiberius.

He ran through the important matter of polite greetings, and assessing whether someone expected a bow or not, and dismissed the group to practise on each other and anyone they encountered. It might be a long, hard journey for some of them, but at least not so long and hard as for those who had refused to attend.

And Miss Brocklehurst and her grassy knoll were probably not going to be coming back if her shrieks on standing up were anything to go by.

Dumbledore had meanwhile consulted another curse breaker who assured him that whoever had halted so evil a curse was well outside the league of anyone else in England and that without tapping his own magic to keep him alive, the curse could not have been broken.

This might not have been strictly true, but it was true so far as the highly trained St Mungo's curse breaker understood things.

Dumbledore was briefly furious that Tiberius had not warned him, but judging by what the Healer said, it could have been that his old academic rival had not known. Dumbledore resigned himself to diminishing magic and began plotting how to get the most action against Tom Riddle before the dark mage found out that his magic was becoming less of a threat.

 **Chapter 6**

Binns would have to go. It was no use having a teacher of wizarding history whose only purpose was to allow the pests to catch up on sleep from their nefarious overnight mischief; and moreover a good and complete grounding in history would consolidate the etiquette lessons.

Tiberius had a brainwave.

He had no need to get rid of Binns, he could just ask the castle to wall off the classroom where he taught and leave him happily droning on about the goblin wars to an audience of no students, and open another classroom as a history classroom. He studied the résumés of past pupils who had managed to get a NEWT in history despite Binns, which generally consisted of Ravenclaws who had studied on their own time, or Slytherin who were proud of their own family's part in history, and set about making enquiries into where they were now and what they were doing.

He was appalled to find a Ravenclaw girl working as a waitress in a teashoppe and sent her an owl asking if she would be willing to attend an interview.

Amanda Parkins turned up on the Knight Bus.

"Well met, Headmaster," she said.

"Well met, Miss Parkins. If I may be so rude as to dispense with the usual pleasantries, since I don't want to waste your time, I was wondering why a girl with five NEWTs should be working as a waitress," said Tiberius.

She gave a bitter laugh.

"I'm muggleborn, professor; the ministry has a lot of excuses, which range from being overqualified to having the wrong qualifications."

Tiberius nodded.

"I'm afraid I wondered if it was that. I've instituted classes in Wizarding etiquette, some of which I note you have picked up, which ought to help integration, but it really needs consolidation in understanding the history of our world, and that cannot be gained through Binns."

"I studied on my own time because I was fascinated," said Amanda. "You couldn't pass the OWL, never mind the NEWT if you didn't; the exam is somewhat biased towards the goblin wars but there are other parts to it."

"Quite, and I shall be having a word with the examination board to see about broadening it further. The long and short of it is that I need a history teacher, and based on your qualifications I'm going to give you a trial, on the premise that nobody could be worse than Binns, and you're more or less at a loose end. If you'd taken the job in order to learn to be a chef because it fascinated you, I'd have moved on to the next person on my list."

"Th … thank you, headmaster! When do I start?"

"Now. There's a second year history class starting after the break, so any brief overview in the new history classroom would be an improvement. If you're up for the challenge?"

"I'm up for the challenge," said Amanda. "I'm a Ravenclaw after all, but I'll want to brush up a bit more for any more senior classes."

"Oh that's understood and I'll certainly help out," said Tiberius. "I didn't take it to NEWT but I've read history on my own time."

"Er, thank you, sir. I will do my best; and as you say, I can hardly be worse than Binns."

OoOoOo

Severus and friends were the lucky recipients of the new teacher, having been redirected to the classroom next door to the one for which they had been making by Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington, otherwise known as Nearly-Headless Nick. They entered with some trepidation and the attractive young woman in ill-fitting academic robes, borrowed from Minerva McGonagall, smiled gravely and asked them to be seated.

"Good afternoon, class. I am Professor Parkins and I will be teaching history from now on. I have not had time to prepare any lesson plans, so I intend to give you a brief overview of the run-up to the imposition of the statute of secrecy, the reasons behind it, and the effect on the wizarding world of drawing away from the muggle world. One of the effects is that the courtesies expected in the wizarding world are little changed from those of the 1690s, and I wonder if anyone has any idea why we should retain such formality. Yes?" she pointed to Ignatius Weasley who had put his hand up.

"Perversity and blood snobbery!" he said, smirking at the Marauders.

"Dear me, I fear you have entirely misunderstood, Mr., uh…"

"Weasley," said Weasley.

"Mr. Weasley, indeed, and I hope to be able to enlighten your failure to grasp the reasons."

"Well of course it's blood snobbery, it's done by the blood snob families and I …."

He was suddenly silenced.

"Mr. Weasley, I don't want to hear your own reverse blood snobbery, thank you, pray listen more than you speak. You might learn something. You spoke Mr. er ?" she pointed at James Potter. He rose.

"Sorry, Ma'am, just said I didn't think it was likely, Weasley learning anything. I'm James Potter."

"I will expect 30 repetitions in your best handwriting 'manners maketh man' in my pigeon hole by Friday," said Amanda.

"Yes, Ma'am," said James, reflecting that he wasn't going to get away with anything with her, but at least she wasn't too tough. Professor Prince would probably have made it one hundred.

"Can anyone else think of a reason why we continue with a courtesy that most muggles would consider outmoded and strange?" asked Amanda. Severus put up his hand, a little hesitantly.

"Mr.?"

"Prince, ma'am. Is it because we're all armed and dangerous after we reach eleven, and courtesy can stop a situation happening?"

"Well done, Mr. Prince. A wise muggle once said 'jaw-jaw is better than war-war' which is a simplistic way of putting it, but he was speaking to the muggle ministry at the time, and they, like our own ministry needed things put in words of few syllables. Thank you, Mr. Prince, for the compliment, but please don't interrupt." Severus had muttered to Remus "I like her."

Petunia put up her hand.

"Please, ma'am, all American muggles carry guns, why don't they have the same courtesies? I'm Petunia Evans."

"Well, Miss Evans, America is a great big country, which has a lot of space. You don't have to live on top of neighbours you don't like. Here in England, we are clustered together in a small island. Muggles deal with social crowding by talking about the weather, which is also a method used by the people of Japan, an island of comparable size and also crowded with a warrior people. Wizarding society just takes it a shade further because we are all wanded and deadly. Now, in order to understand the Statute of Secrecy which led to this dichotomy …." She quickly outlined the religious wars of the muggles in Europe over the sixteenth and seventeenth century, which had been bad news for muggles and wizarding folk alike, and how wizards had begun something of a withdrawal from muggle society when the more intolerant of religions had seen witchcraft as something to persecute, far more so then in the Middle Ages where being a heretic was worse than being a witch, and most wizards had at least nominally adhered to the Catholic church, whatever beliefs they practised at home. She explained that following the end of these upheavals, the Age of Reason had replaced religion in many ways but it had also been a rejection of belief in magic, since the new sciences fulfilled for muggles the sense of wonder they had previously had in magic. The Statute of Secrecy was a protection against any more wild religious upheavals, and an acknowledgement that muggles, for the most part, no longer wanted to believe.

"Good class," said Severus to his cronies.

"Yeah, but it means we're going to have to be awake," complained Sirius.

"Night time is for sleeping, you big lug," said Petunia.

"Or exploring and looking for secret passages under the cloak," said Sirius.

Petunia and Lily both rolled their eyes.

OoOoOo

"I heard you were looking for a history teacher. I'd rather teach Dark Arts but I can be flexible."

The visitor had once been good looking, but the red eyes and stretched, parchment like skin suggested a toll upon his magical core.

"My thanks, Tom, but I have filled the position," said Tiberius, making a guess. "Now to what do I really owe the … pleasure … of your company?"

The eyes flared redder at the mention of his name.

"I have a new name, you know," the evil wizard hissed.

"Yes, but I fear I'm not childish enough to stoop to anything so puerile as that, Tom," said Tiberius, lightly.

The red was definitely flaring now.

"PUERILE?" Voldemort snarled.

"Well, rather. 'Flees-death' is the sort of rather melodramatic name dreamed up by the average thirteen-year-old loser who hasn't got any friends," said Tiberius. He loosed the wandless and wordless blasting curse as Voldemort got as far as shouting,

"AV…"

The dark lord flew backwards clear out of the study, and tumbled down the stairs, and Tiberius activated the castle magic so that the stone gargoyles seized him at the bottom and flew right out of the castle and through the gates with the stunned and bruised wizard between them.

"And don't come back," Tiberius' sonorous charm was aimed at the gate area only.

Time to set some wards specifically against the aura of that nasty little man. A pity one might not kill him until certain they had killed all his horcruces. The power crackling through his anger was considerable so it was fortunate that he appeared to lack imagination.

Oh well, that rather put the kybosh on considering infiltrating the Death Eaters. A shame, but there you were. It had been an almost Gryffindorish reaction; perhaps there was a curse on the headmaster's study to make people act in a Gryffish sort of way. But there was no way that Tiberius could let him loose teaching, and there was no easy way of denying that, and still professing to follow Lord Losealot. And if the horcruces could all be found and destroyed, then infiltration was unnecessary.

"Right, Phineas Nigellus, I need to know where he went before he came to the office," said Tiberius. "I'm still getting the hang of using the awareness of Hogwarts, bless her, to alert me of things, and I was sluggish in my reactions when I felt him arrive."

"May I say you are doing better than young Albus did when he took over," said Professor Black. "Took him nearly a year to figure out how to use the castle properly; he tried to bend it to his will rather than working with the awareness."

"That figures; Albus always was arrogant," said Tiberius. "I recall you caning him for it."

"Believe me, I have often wished for a cane while he has been pronouncing some of his idiocies," said Phineas Nigellus, grimly. "Can't you make his indisposition more permanent?"

"I won't have to," Tiberius shrugged. "I told him he would need complete rest to replenish his magical core as it was depleted fighting the curse. Do you really think Albus is going to rest completely, especially when he hears rumours of the changes I'm instituting? He's going to try to shove his oar in, and then he's going to overstretch himself and he'll be lucky not to end up in St Mungos for five or six years. Six would do."

"Why six?"

"Then my grandson will be out of his clutches."

"You always were a true Slytherin, Tiberius," said Phineas Nigellus in approval. He slid out of his frame, to question other portraits. The headmaster could question portraits but they took the questioning better from former headmasters who were painted, like them.

Phineas Nigellus returned inside of ten minutes.

"He went to the trophy room," he reported. "Tiberius, is doing a jig in keeping with the dignity of a headmaster?"

"It doesn't matter when there are only other heads watching," said Tiberius. "He came to hide another horcrux; and it'll be the cup of Helga Hufflepuff. Narcissa suggested it."

"A true daughter of the Black family," said Phineas Nigellus.

"And true to the old ideals of accepting adoption of muggle borns to teach them our ways," said Tiberius. "Much more satisfactory than wasting their talents merely despising them, hmm?"

Phineas Nigellus sniffed, but it was less disobliging than the sniffs he was wont to aim at Albus' championing of muggleborn. After all, it was a historic fact that this had been done when muggleborns were few and far between.

Tiberius collected dragonhide gloves, and went to the trophy room. There was a new trophy near to the shield given to Tom Riddle for services to the school; an ornate cup, inscribed to one John Smith for all round excellence. A little obvious. A sensible man would have picked a name from the muggle world that was a bit less pedestrian yet unlikely for any wizard to recognise, like Clark Gable, from Tom's time living as a muggle, or Winston Churchill, or even, for someone with a sense of humour, Adolf Hitler. Well, it was a horcrux, he could feel it, and he would take it back to the study to destroy. That would then be four.

The cup screamed when he poured in basilisk venom, and smoke roiled out of it towards Tiberius who rapidly got a bubble head charm up wordlessly and wandlessly. So, the diadem might still be out there, and if it was, it might or might not yet be a horcrux. They might seek for it in the Room of Requirements perhaps.

 **Chapter 7**

Severus was working on a spell for his friends. Their sense of humour was definitely scatological, and Severus had been outwardly sneering over such basic humour, and inwardly fascinated by the challenges involved in enhancing the amount of wind projected by a fart to blow the robes backwards with vigour. So far he had succeeded in something in which he personally rejoiced; the ability to make his robes billow impressively as he turned and left a room, rather after the fashion of baddies in B-movies swirling their cloaks. He had been sidetracked into perfecting the effect before returning to enhancing farts.

He had got to the stage of having to decide whether to make it an area of effect spell, or a single spell, like his billowing. Area of effect would be more entertaining. He could always refine it for a single person if they wanted to target a single person. He was also noting algorithms to use for other fart-affecting spells, since no doubt there would be other uses to which James, Sirius and Petunia in particular would want to put such spell components.

He had made the mistake of noting some algorithms in his Arithmancy note book, and had received a tart comment from Madam Vector to the effect that if he must show off that he could achieve fifth year work on matrices, perhaps he would be good enough to do so on standard spellcrafting rather than on gastric events. Severus was taking arithmancy alongside runes in the fourth year class, having made the effort over the holidays to be on a par with Myrtle. The fourth year arithmancers appreciated him no more than did the runic class, feeling it an affront to have a babe of twelve in with them, and, more to the point, surpassing them. Severus was looking forward to testing his spell crafting on them, with less brute force methods than he had used in the first year. The runes drawn on his friends' bottoms had worked, but it was not a good jinx. This one would be a jinx, and so would be the dragonbottom jinx when he had successfully tied the Wenlock logic, what muggles called Boolean Algebra, to the act of farting to cast bluebell flames and set light to people's farts. It should be safe enough if done outside the robes, because the weave would prevent blowback, because of Sir Humphrey Davy. Severus was a little vague about Sir Humphrey Davy, other than that he had invented the miner's safety lamp, on which principle his spell safety was based, and that he 'lived under the odium of having discovered sodium.' Muggle primary schools were not specific on science. But then, muggle primary schools wouldn't teach useful stuff such as basilisk venom can be used to destroy a horcrux. It was good that Granddad had destroyed another one.

Severus cleared his mind. It was a good idea to practice occlumensy in case any of the Death Eaters in school learned legilimensy. And it let him go into a meditative state which meant that he could attack a problem renewed and refreshed.

OoOoOo

Tiberius asked Hogwarts to make another good, big suite of rooms for him, and announced it at supper.

"I have arranged a new common room," he told the school. "This is a place where you can hang out with friends or siblings in other houses, without having to go into their common room, or invite them into yours. It is neutral territory, and anyone fighting in there will be banned from it for as long as the staff feel necessary. Three times banned means the third ban is permanent. I mean it. This is also a place where you might hold cross house clubs without having to use a classroom. There are four rooms to it, a main common room and three other rooms to use as hobbies rooms or clubrooms. Clubs need to book times to be held and write this in to the book which is in each room, so that there is no overlap. The provision of equipment is up to the club, but a petition to the head will be considered carefully if you want anything unusual."

Lily Evans put up her hand.

"Miss Evans?"

"What about muggle equipment which isn't electrical?" she asked.

"Why would you want muggle equipment?" asked Tiberius.

"Because sewing charms aren't very good, and hand sewing is tedious and slow, and it would be nice to make our own robes from time to time," she said.

"A good cogent argument," said Tiberius. "Have we a prefect willing to oversee muggle equipment and establish safety rules? Miss Black? Thank you," as Narcissa raised her hand. "I will see what I can do to pick up some antique hand- and treadle-operated sewing machines, Miss Evans. You will have to teach Miss Black how to use them, as any machinery, goblin or muggle, can be dangerous unless you know what you are doing."

"Thank you sir," said Lily.

"Why do you want to use muggle things, Cissy?" asked Laeticia Parkinson, one of Narcissa's form mates.

"For the reason Evans cited; sewing charms aren't that good, and hand sewing is tedious and slow, and I'm not permitted an elven or goblin seamstress in school," said Narcissa, calmly. "I like designing my own clothes. Makes them unique, and yes, that gown you admired so much and were trying to find out about was one I designed and partly sewed for myself, leaving the boring bits to Ragilde, the seamstress my family uses, or Tissy, my elf, who likes sewing. I am sure Evans knows what she's talking about with regards to muggle artefacts, so I'm not about to pass up the opportunity to be more stunning than usual just on grounds of the machine being muggle made. You ride in a steam engine, after all, which might have been improved by goblins, but actually it was made by muggles and acquired for the use of the school." There had been a discussion, rather heated, over who had invented steam power, and Narcissa had had to admit, to her chagrin, that the muggle dates preceded the first use of steam by goblins. She had investigated, and discovered that the current Hogwarts Express had been purchased from muggles in the early years of the 1960s to replace an earlier model, when muggles were moving to a different sort of engine. She went on, "It's quite new, made less than a decade ago, to replace the hundred-and-twenty-year-old engine purchased by the Ministry, soon after muggles made viable railway engines. They got a lot better at it over a hundred years and more," she added, dryly. "And this one goes faster, so there is less risk of it being targeted by Tommy Riddle and his nasty little gang."

"Oh!" said Parkinson.

Severus could have told Parkinson, and had told Narcissa [who had rapidly and conveniently forgotten] that the locomotive was a Hall class 4-6-0 Great Western 4999a, _Merlin's Hall_ , mixed traffic engine, and that it didn't perform as well as his favourite engine, the _Mallard_ or her sister _Sir Nigel Gresley_ , but as they were only two of six of a special and streamlined prototype, the muggles would miss them from their museums as they were very distinctive. After all, with Gulbraithian fire and a continuous supply of water from level-activated aguamenti spells, and streamlining spells, the Hogwarts Express ran a great deal faster than the record-winning _Mallard_ 's 126 mph. It actually ran faster than the most up-to-date diesel-electric. Severus had worked it out. Magic had its uses.

Tiberius cleared his throat over the chatter.

"I just want to make it clear that the muggle sewing machines are _not_ to be enchanted without clearance for any intended enchantments being obtained from the Use of Muggle Artefacts office," he said firmly.

Like they were likely to obey that stricture. But it had to be a firmly stated ukase and if they got caught, it was an offence they could be punished for, if need be. Tiberius could only think of using magic to turn the drive shaft, whether hand-cranked or treadled, but doubtless the ingenious and nefarious imaginations of teenagers would come up with something else. Even if only to enchant the things to embroider 'Mulciber stinks' on the front of the boy's robes.

And even without enchantment, doubtless they would soon discover how quick it was to sew up the sleeves and neck of a nightshirt, even if only for inconvenience and without reference to the bloody demise of the trapped Agamemnon at the hands of Clytemnestra for the sacrifice of their daughter Iphigenia, and the killing Clytemnestra's first child and her previous husband before forcing her to wed him. Hopefully most of the children were not that well acquainted with the messier side of the classics. Clytemnestra was not to have known that Iphigenia was a muggle-born witch who apparated away with untrained magic as the sacrificial knife fell, nor that her husband's real reason for wanting to sacrifice the child was fear of her powers.

He might regret having the wretched machines, but mischief would be managed one way or another anyway, and it would be nice to make sure the poorer students had decent robes to wear for the Yule Ball. He recalled the embarrassment of some of his own fellows, and it had hardly been any better for those like the Prewetts last year. Indeed he would hire some goblin girls to help with makeovers for this year. Human seamstresses would embarrass some of the young folk.

OoOoOo

Severus was helping Sirius with his geomantic measuring, to make his map.

"We don't need to measure it with paces, call yourself a wizard?" he said, scornfully, as Sirius tried to persuade him to match stride length. "We have wands of known length, and we can cast the echo-location charm and a timing spell to check how long it takes to get back."

"How will that help us?" asked Sirius.

"Because, you dunderhead, sound travels at a set speed in air," said Severus. "Honestly, Sirius, it's not rocket science."

"What's rocket science?"

Severus sighed.

"Something muggles consider very difficult. I grew up with a lot of muggle expressions, all right? I should have said, it's not human transfigurational theory."

"Well, I kinda get human transfigurational theory, I've been reading about it, and I want to be an animagus."

"Well to most people, you poor prune!" Severus growled.

"Am I interrupting?" a voice interposed, and the boys swung round, beholding one of their least favourite Slytherin sixth formers, Rabastan Lestrange.

The Slytherin lad came up to the younger boys

"Well met, younger son of the House of Lestrange," said Severus, warily. He would have preferred to have greeted Rabastan with a well-rounded hex, but it was not in keeping with the protocols he had learned to believe in, and besides, maybe the younger brother wanted to escape his older brother's influence.

"Is this your scarf, scion Prince?" asked Rabastan, holding out a red and gold scarf.

"No, but I can see whose it is, thanks," said Severus, taking it from the boy.

"Go!" said Rabastan, and with a startled cry, Severus and the scarf disappeared.

This was enough for Sirius to disregard all protocol, because a good pure-blood gentleman knew exactly when to stop being a gentleman and become a pure-blood fury. Severus' rubber ball jinx left Rabastan bouncing uncomfortably and noisily on the spot under a very wayward tarantallegra curse, tickling curse and farting hex.

Sirius belted for the headmaster's office, and got there as Tiberius was reading a letter which had appeared through the floo.

"Sirius!"

"Sev was taken somewhere by portkey, it was a scarf, and Rabastan did it," said Sirius, in one breath.

"Confirmation of the letter," said Tiberius, grimly, passing it to Sirius.

It read,

" _I have your grandson, old man. All your hopes for your family name. Now, I'm not that bothered about a job teaching brainless nitwits, but I do want your services. A demon master would be useful to me. When you have calmed down, I will meet you in the Hog's Head. Do not try to double cross me; there are so many breakable things about, like Hogsmeade._

 _Lord Voldemort."_

 **Chapter 8**

Severus was still in mid yelp when he landed in the atrium of some fairly grand mansion.

"Aww poor ickle baby Sevvy, cwying alweady," said a lush, dark-haired witch, who looked disturbingly like a dark version of Narcissa.

The handsome young man with red eyes smiled.

"Dear me, a noisy entrance," he said.

Severus pulled himself together, and bowed.

"Well met, eldest scion of the junior branch of the Noble and Ancient family Black," he said to Bellatrix Black. "Well met, only scion of the muggle house of Riddle."

The scarlet eyes burned like fire.

" _Crucio!"_ Riddle screeched, and Severus fell to the ground, screams wrested from him unbidden as pain beyond pain seared through every nerve like fire and ice and electricity. He could not guess how long the agony lasted, but he felt it diminish as he lay in the foetal position, puking up everything he had eaten that day.

"You will call me 'My Lord' or 'Lord Voldemort!'" screeched the dark lord.

"My apologies," Severus made himself sit. "I should have said, last scion of the house of Gaunt, half-blood."

This time the screaming seemed to come from someone else, but the pain was all his. Severus wondered if it was possible to vomit up your own socks. He lay twitching and convulsing after it was over.

"I may give some time to your instruction later," said Riddle, in a thin, cold voice. "However, I have need of your grandfather, and I will doubtless have to show you alive and relatively unharmed. I will return to see if you are more respectful; Bella, watch him, but do not damage him."

"Not even a little bit?" Bella's eyes were hungry. "He wouldn't miss the odd toe."

"Intact and unharmed, Bella," said Riddle. "You can tell him bedtime stories if you like."

"Thank you, Master!" her eyes glowed. Severus surreptitiously cast a wandless, wordless privacy charm of his own devising on himself, twisting it inside out so he would not hear more than a muffled sound and concentrated on remaining curled up, as though catatonic.

OoOoOo

"Sirius," said Tiberius, "We have destroyed the diary, the locket, the cup, and the ring. We have postulated that he might have made as many as six; I want you to collect the rest of the Marauders and go to the Room of Requirements and ask for things hidden by Tom Riddle. Use dragonhide gloves to take anything you find to my office, and use the basilisk venom there if any feel like a horcrux."

"Yessir," said Sirius. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to Hogsmeade to meet with the egomaniacal little twat and bargain for Severus's life of course," said Tiberius. "When you have seen if there are any horcruces, I want you to get Phil Lovegood to use his odd divinational skills together with your geomancy and see if you can triangulate a position on Severus. There are maps of magical places in my study which you can use. And if you need another location, you can ask the Room of Requirements to open a gate to Prince Manor. And tell Leroy Shacklebolt all about it."

"Yessir," said Sirius again, and bolted off to collect his friends.

OoOoOo

The friends looked at an odd collection of items they had found in the Room of Requirements; a pocket watch of chased silver, a snitch, what looked to be an essay on the draught of living death, with a piece of gold sealing wax on it stamped with 'prize essay', a bundle of letters starting, "my dearest daughter", and a remembrall.

None of them felt like dark objects.

"Tiberius told us that Dumbledore said he collected things in the orphanage, remember," said Narcissa. "To cause hurt to others; trophies."

Sirius nodded.

"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar," quoted Petunia.

"What?" James was baffled.

"Oh, there was this famous psychologist – mind healer – who was a bit obsessed with people playing with willy-shaped things," said Petunia. "And he said, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Not a replacement willy. Well, you know grownups, they're all obsessed with sex, look how often you come across upper sixth couples snogging and humping in closets and alcoves."

"Fair point," said Sirius.

They moved to the maps to try to locate their friend, Phil plying divining rods grimly, with a hair from Severus' hairbrush as his ritual guide, and Sirius with his hands lightly on Phil's hands to feel the place.

"There! He's there!" Phil cried, just as Auror Shacklebolt came in with Petunia, who had been sent to find him. A point on the map had suddenly started glowing and runes appeared.

OoOoOo

Severus remained curled up while Bella talked at him, froth forming around her painted lips, her eyes bright and mad. Severus whimpered occasionally; she seemed to require a response, and he really did not want to hear what she was telling him. He fancied it might be worse in a way than the cruciatus curse. She poked him with a pointed boot, saying something with a disdainful look. Severus hoped that she was merely regretting not being allowed to hurt him, not planning to start doing anything. He still had his wand in its holster, but it might be better not to let anyone know this.

Bellatrix grew bored of lowering over an unresponsive cry-baby she was not allowed to hurt, and flung herself into a chair.

Severus wrapped the _muffliatus_ around him the right way, and murmured,

"Tessi?"

The elf did not come; presumably this place was warded against elves not belonging to the family; or maybe the wards were against him personally.

Stealthily, Severus reached a finger towards the puddle of vomit, grimacing, but reflecting that he had no other writing materials other than permanently carving runes into the stone floor with his wand. And stomach fluids would contain his own body fluids, which would be almost as good as blood. Ehwaz would help motion, Laguz, healing and renewal but also success in travel. Ansuz, Odin's own rune, message and insight, signals. Raido, travel, and Kenaz, knowledge, inspiration. Now the blood, and he bit off a hangnail for want of a better way to get it, and let it flow into each rune as he chanted them, picturing his grandfather's office.

The sensation was horrible, like a side-along apparation whilst being tumbled headlong. Apparently it was a rather brute-force way of apparating.

Severus tumbled into a heap on the floor of the headmaster's office, the shaking set off again as Leroy Shacklebolt was trying to unravel the story these kids were telling him.

Leroy Shacklebolt was a man who carried healing potions at all times, and he had an anti-cruciatus. He recognised the signs. He poured the potion into Severus' mouth. This was no game invented by bored twelve year olds; he should have realised from the first, and made a mental apology for having been about to tick them off for wasting his time.

James clicked his fingers.

"Castle elf!" he called.

An elf appeared, looking a little truculent, since students were not supposed to call the elves. If they had not been in the head's office, he would not have come.

"Be a good chap and pop to the Hog's Head and let the headmaster know that his grandson is safe," said James, with all the polite arrogance of a scion of a Noble and Ancient family.

"At once!" squeaked the elf, and disappeared.

OoOoOo

Tiberius had entered the Hog's Head, and saw Riddle immediately.

"You calm down quickly," said Riddle.

"I didn't need to calm down," said Tiberius, mendaciously. "I have arranged a marriage for my granddaughter; she can provide me with spares."

"Ah, a true Slytherin," laughed Riddle. "But she might prove barren in her later years, or drop only daughters. A bird in hand is worth two in a bush."

Tiberius shrugged.

"I don't want to lose the boy, or I wouldn't have come," he said. "What do you want?"

"I want you to raise demons for me," said Riddle, "And to show me how to do it."

"Do you think I was born yesterday?" snorted Tiberius. "It takes years to learn how to raise a demon, but even if you were prepared to learn, I don't think I'll open myself to becoming expendable as soon as you have learned how to do it yourself. What sort of demons did you want?"

"Large ones to frighten people with," said Riddle, simply.

"Oh, the big ones with horns, flames and pitchforks so beloved of medieval illustrators?" said Tiberius.

"That was more or less what I had in mind," admitted Riddle.

"Fine. Now, I want guarantees that my grandson is alive and well."

"You have my word."

"You must be joking; I don't trust your word written down and sealed in blood. I will want to see him and talk to him."

"Well, he's a little indisposed at the moment. He was disrespectful to me," almost spat the wizard, his eyes going red at the memory.

"Disrespectful? Why Tommy, I am sure he would not forget to greet you as a scion of the muggle house of Riddle," said Tiberius.

The eyes went even redder.

"You have taught him to disparage me!" he shrieked. " _Crucio!"_

Tiberius had been expecting it, and had a maximum protection charm up, supplementing the several runic warded amulets he also wore.

"How boring of you, Tommy," he said. "Such a limited vocabulary."

At that moment a school elf turned up.

"Headmaster, your grandson is safe!" he chirped.

"Thank you," said Tiberius. "I decline your offer, Tommy." And he reached over and pulled Riddle's nose, a move the dark lord would never have expected. And then Tiberius was apparating away, and the aurors he had alerted were out in force in the streets as he sent his patronus as a message to them, where they were concealed in Honeydukes.

How the children had retrieved Severus, he had no idea, but apparently they had succeeded in doing so.

OoOoOo

Bella had gazed away briefly, and suddenly noticed that the child had gone! She ran over, kicking, and feeling, in case he was invisible. In doing so, she obscured the runic lettering on the floor, and indeed banished the puddle of vomit in distaste.

Then she cast revealing spells in a hurry.

And then she crumpled onto the floor, hugging herself and rocking, in fear of what her master would say and do.

OoOoOo

Tiberius unravelled the stories.

"A cigar sometimes is only a cigar, well done, Petunia," he said. "Mmmm. I don't know if your runes would have worked alone, Severus; but that you had a finder at the other end, I believe, pulled as you pushed, as one might say. Cocoa all round, I think. I need it, even if you don't."

"And you need a jolt of Firewhisky in yours, sir, I suspect," said Severus, who knew grownups needed a tot at times, without it getting as out of hand as his father's drinking had. He did not see the allure himself, but grown-ups were odd creatures.

 **Chapter 9**

Rabastan Lestrange still had to be dealt with, and Tiberius discovered the boy, still farting and bouncing, on the third floor. Sirius had evidently put a lot of power into that set of jinxes, or some of them should have worn off. Tiberius undid them all, tempting as it was to kick the boy down the stairs and all the way out of the castle.

Rabastan took one look at his headmaster's face, and paled.

"I didn't know what it was going to do," he blustered. His eyes slid to the left as he tried to meet Tiberius in the eye.

"Liar," said Tiberius. "However, you will be questioned under veritaserum in my office, by my permission by aurors, in case my belief in your distinct lack of veracity is in any wise wrong. If you are a liar, you're going to Azkaban.

Rabastan swayed, and Tiberius frog-marched him to his office, where one of the detachment of aurors who had been protecting Hogsmeade from Tom Riddle's wrath awaited him.

Three drops of veritaserum and Rabastan explained how his brother had told him to give the Prince brat a portkey to their Master, who had need of the skills of the boy's great-grandfather.

Bella Black would have to defer her wedding to Rodolphus; both boys left with the auror, pending trial and almost certain imprisonment.

Things settled back to normal, but somehow Severus felt detached. He went wandering by himself more.

And then he was cornered by Sirius and Remus.

They were his friends; he could hardly tell them to go away.

"Sev-mate," said Sirius, "I've taken it too, you know. From Bella. When she found out I was Griffindor. And mother didn't stop her."

"I've been broken into pieces to regrow as a wolf. Every month," said Remus. "You didn't know what you had done for me, why I love you so much, my brother, my friend. Now you understand the pain like Siri does. We don't have to talk about it if you don't want to; but we both know."

And then Severus was crying and clinging to both of them.

They didn't need to say anything.

Now they all had people who knew.

oOoOoO

Tiberius read a letter from Rose Evans-Prince with a grim expression. The people who had bought their house had been killed messily, and the dark mark sent up; and news was coming in of the deaths of the parents of other muggle born as well. Regulus Black had brought his sobbing friend, Adam Flanders to his friend's grandfather, begging for him to be made a Prince, since Regulus' own parents could not be relied on to protect a muggleborn, suddenly orphaned.

It was because Severus had escaped, Tiberius had no doubt; but it would have happened sooner or later.

He summoned the school to the great hall.

"I'm going to be bringing in all the parents of muggleborn and half-bloods who have not yet been targeted," he said. "And arrange for all your families to be adopted into pure blood families. Half-bloods might want to arrange your family to be adopted into your magical side's family, but anyone who wants protection of bloodwards will get it. I may have to blow up half the wizgamot to get it, but we will not abandon you. Those purebloods whose families are likely to be willing, please stand."

David Greengrasse was first on his feet, followed by the Prewett twins, Lucius Malfoy, Amelia Bones, Xenophilus Lovegood, and a selection of others.

Tiberius smiled.

"Representatives from every house; I am pleased," he said. "Please owl your parents and ask them to come, ready to cast mass rituals. I will be arranging the arrival of those in most need, and I sincerely apologise to those of you for whom this is too late. I thought we might have more time in hand, and I wanted you to be more used to the protocol classes and to write to your parents preparing them. I will ask you to write, using school owls, to ask them to be packed and ready to come. It's a monstrous imposition but I cannot otherwise keep them safe."

Adam Flanders raised a hand.

"Thank you for doing your best, sir," he said.

"Thank you for forgiving me for not being infallible, Adam," said Tiberius. "Perhaps you'd better be a Marauder, and learn to fight back."

"Yes, sir, I will," said Adam.

"Really, Tiberius, must you encourage them?" said Minerva.

"Yes, Min, I think I must," said Tiberius. "Pomona understands; it's about loyalty, love, and support."

"Yes, Tiberius, I understand," said Pomona. "Badgers can fight very hard if cornered."

Severus rose.

"What about Tobias? I don't want him dead."

"I'll go talk to him."

"No, sir. Let Tessi come to take me and I'll talk to him."

Tiberius regarded the little boy for a long moment. But then, he had stopped being a little boy when he had felt the cruciatus curse. He nodded.

"Very well."

OoOoOo

"What do you want, boy? That wussy school of magic expel you because you are too wussy at magic as well as at being manly?"

Severus saw red, briefly, and then washed it in cold. He smiled, and began to scientifically beat his father up, using the big man's size against him. Again and again he hit him until his father was half lying on the floor, moaning.

Then he drew his wand.

"That's right, hex a man when he's down," said his father, painfully.

"You know, I do take after you, father," said Severus, surprised. "I have your sassy mouth when I've been beaten down and am in danger of my life. You are right to fear the wizarding world, and I'll tell you why in a minute. But right now, I am planning to heal you."

He waved his wand carefully, mending broken bones, putting his father's jaw back and replacing the teeth he had knocked out. His own elbow was bleeding from having been cut by them, but he ignored that. Then he gave his father a potion while he rubbed in bruise paste.

"I didn't know it could heal as well," said Tobias, who chugged the potion, after a suspicious look at it.

"You never asked," said Severus. "Now shut up and listen to me; I've won the right to a hearing."

"You have," said Tobias. "My boy! You don't look much, but you're bloody hard."

"Yes, and I'm hard with magic, too," said Severus. "I can do things mother never learned. And because of that, Grandfather allowed me to come and take you to safety before my enemy kills you just for being related to me."

"Kills?"

"He doesn't mess about," said Severus, grimly. "Now I'm sure you've heard from the goblins about the dark lord, he-who-must-not-be-named."

"Yeah, what's it to do with me?"

"The general fact that he is sworn to kill the muggle parents of every muggleborn witch and wizard or halfblood is a good start," said Severus. "The fact that I defied him and took two cruciatus curses from him, and then escaped makes the matter personal to him."

Tobias paled.

"Your mother's father cast that on me once," he said. "When Eileen and I were courting. It was what made her come with me willingly and be disowned."

"Then you understand what it's like," said Severus.

"It ain't natural," said Tobias.

"It isn't," agreed Severus. "It's dark magic of the darkest, and it's called one of the forbidden curses for a good reason; it's forbidden. My late grandpapa was lucky not to end up in prison for it."

"Even though I'm a … muggle?"

"Yes, dad, even though you're a muggle. Because nobody has any right to cast that. I'm quite glad he's dead, because I'd feel obligated to kill him otherwise, for hurting my sire in such a way," said Severus, seriously. "I'm glad you're sober today. It would have made it harder if I had needed to fight through drunken miasmas and your crapulent maunderings."

"You haven't stopped cracking your jaw on big words then," growled Tobias.

Severus laughed.

"No, and that's a me thing, not a wizard thing, as most of my friends have to look for dictionaries when I get going," he said.

"I'm on the wagon," said Tobias. "It was feeling inadequate next to your ma what made me drink."

"And she felt intimidated by your physical bulk and strength," said Severus. "Really, I do wish grown-ups wouldn't be so childish!"

Tobias flushed.

"Where are you going to take me?"

"You're coming? No arguments?"

"Why would I argue? I don't want to be killed, especially for personal reasons. And it stands to reason that you haven't stopped loving me, or you'd just leave me to it."

Severus stared.

"Oh Dad!" he said. "I … I guess that must be true. And Mum should have taught you more about the wizarding world so you wouldn't feel so much at sea, like the purebloods feel if I'm spouting off about muggle science to them."

"You got good grades in school," said Tobias. "I never was much good at book learning."

"No, but you're street smart, and … and if you'll be ready to help too, I reckon that might help a lot," said Severus.

"Really?"

"Yes, sir! You see, this dark lord is like me, a halfblood. Only his father abandoned him before he was born…" he told the story of Tom Riddle.

Tobias Snape scratched his head.

"He sounds like a psychopath to me," he said.

Severus beamed.

"There you are, you know the right words to look up in a muggle library," he said. "If we know how a psychopath acts, we might out-think him."

"And nobody else has suggested it?"

"DAD! Wizards are really most extraordinarily ignorant about muggle science, and psychology is a muggle science! In fact, wizards can be extraordinarily ignorant about a lot of things. I'm educating my friends, and helping those without wizarding backgrounds to understand wizards. We can't fight Lord Losealot, what one of our sixers calls him, without understanding of each other."

"I suppose, sober, that makes sense," said Tobias. "Well, it beats joining the Salvation Army to get fed, I suppose. On the wagon I might be, but there's only so much I can take."

OoOoOo

On his way to Tiberius' office with Tobias, Severus passed the history classroom where the majority of his confederates were having a lesson with Miss Parkins. Amanda was apparently verbally shredding Petunia, and Severus paused to listen. He was sorry for Tuney, but Parkins could be entertaining.

"Miss Evans." The tone held evident attempts at patience. "Your unfounded comments that the great Italian wizard, Leonardo da Vinci is a wuss has no basis in anything concrete. Your claim that he wore panty-hose and a miniskirt in no wise accurately represents the fashions of the time and is, moreover, irrelevant. I don't believe you even read the chapter on his achievements which I set before embarking on this ill-informed and sorry excuse for an essay. You will do it over for me."

Severus looked at his father, who was grinning.

"Well, whaddya know, history and acidulated schoolmarms ain't so very different for your types," said Tobias.

Severus grinned back.

"Petunia skimped the homework, and I'm afraid has nobody but herself to blame," he said. "A lot of people are still trying to come to terms with having to work in History; our previous teacher was a ghost and while he bored on, a lot of people napped. He never marked assignments anyway."

"A ghost? They exist?"

"Yeah, but it's no big deal," said Severus.

He delivered his father to Tiberius, who looked on Tobias with disfavour.

"I'm on the wagon," said Tobias, defiantly "But I guess Eileen and I just ain't compatible. We bring out the worst in each other."

"He was pretty good about coming, granddad," said Severus. "He needs to learn properly about the wizarding world, the way you taught me."

Tiberius nodded.

"You'll be my pensioner for a while, Tobias, because you are kin of my kin, and that counts in our world. I will keep you safe, and I hope that you will learn enough not to feel so threatened by Eileen and Severus."

Tobias flushed.

"I hope so too," he mumbled. "My son is dead hard, and I want to stop some no-good poncy halfbreed whackjob from trying to kill him."

"Well, in that case, my dear chap, perhaps you will dredge up your recollections of your national service, and train those who are interested in how to use muggle firearms," said Tiberius.

Tobias brightened.

"Now that I can do, as well as come up with words like 'psychopath' for the boy to research," he said. "If you can get me firearms to train with."

"Oh, I shall," said Tiberius. "And silver bullets for the werewolves."

Tobias gulped. This world of his son's got scarier by the minute.

But if his wife's grandsire thought that guns and silver bullets would be a counter, then maybe werewolves got less scary.

 **Chapter 10**

"You need to make me your groundskeeper or sump'n," said Tobias to Tiberius.

"I already have a groundskeeper," said Tiberius. "I can find you a job if you want."

Tobias shook his head.

"You don't understand. I need the sort of job that will allow me to get a gun. I was thinking that if I was a groundsman or gamekeeper I could have a shotgun. Now making silver bullets for a rifle, that's hard. Filling a twelve-bore with silver buckshot, now that's easy. All I need is junk jewellery and shove it in a cartridge, it doesn't need to even be made into pellets."

"Very well, gamekeeper seems good," said Tiberius. "Tell me what documentation you need and I'll arrange it, and I'll buy you whatever weapons you need. You can teach Sev and his friends to shoot as well. I'm sure they'll happily shoot werewolves. One of them was bitten when he was a little kid, made into a werewolf. I've been able to cure him, but he wants to stop the bastard who gave him the sort of monthly condition no kid ought to have to cope with."

"Bloody hell!" said Tobias. "I want a stiff drink right now, and I'm fighting off asking you for one."

"Good man," said Tiberius. "I have more respect for you now than I have ever had before. You know Eileen will be teaching for a term here after Yule?"

Tobias shrugged.

"I expect in a pile this size we can avoid each other," he said.

"Probably wise," said Tiberius.

OoOoOo

Severus, meanwhile, had been thinking.

"Do you oiks remember how Cissy found the portrait of Salazar Slytherin tucked away in a back passage last year?" he asked.

"How could we forget?" said James. "Not an exciting business at all, finding a horcrux, chatting to Sthass who is a sixty foot snake with killer eyes and collecting his venom, a very mundane matter."

"Oy, I do the snide around here," said Severus.

After a brief scuffle, he and James put themselves back to the right colours, removed the tentacles on their faces, returned their noses to the proper length and retrieved their ears from the sides of the clock. They would have been genuinely amazed to find that this piece of mischief required a spell usually considered to be a fourth year transfiguration spell; Severus had discovered switching charms in a book when looking up something else and had considered them cool.

"What a pair of disreputable objects you both are," said Petunia.

"And that's different to normal how?" asked Lily. "Severus, did you have a point in reminding us about finding Sal?"

"Yes, I did," said Severus. "It occurred to me that there aren't any pictures of any of the founders apart from Sal, and I wondered why."

"We have a bust of Rowena Ravenclaw in Ravenclaw tower," volunteered Phil.

"That's no help though," said Severus. "Busts can't leap around the school the way portraits can."

"We could ask Sal," said Narcissa.

"You can ask Sal, because he doesn't pop out of his portrait to nose about like some of them do," said Severus. "However, we can poke about in Gryffindor House, Phil and Myrtle can poke about in Ravenclaw, and Reg and Adam can poke about Hufflepuff."

"I bet all the Puffs would help with something like that," said Adam. "It's a matter of House honour, and Puffs stick up for Puffs."

"Ravers, I'm afraid, drop other Ravers in it," said Phil.

"Slytherin stick up for other Slytherin to outsiders," said Narcissa, a little defensively, "And we do have Sal, so other than feeding information from him, I'm a little superfluous in this."

"Never superfluous," said Remus, quietly.

Sirius was looking slightly stricken.

"Sev, mate, it's just occurred to me that maybe we chose our house too quickly," he said. "Gryffindors band together against Slytherins, but you know what? As a House we are ready to point and giggle at one of our own in trouble. And we do not keep our quarrels in-House, we pursue them in public. That … that isn't light behaviour, or loyalty."

Severus shrugged.

"We went for 'not Malfoy's house', and maybe the reason the Hat put us in Gryffindor was to improve Godric's House from being a bunch of uncouth savages with delusions of ever-rightness into a trained bunch of uncouth savages who actually look at issues not parrot back the received lack of wisdom of light philosophy."

"I take back any comments that I can do snide as well as Sev," said James.

OoOoOo

Lucius Malfoy, meanwhile, was about to make a life-changing decision. He heard the sounds of a scream of pain, and altered his direction towards it. The voice was one he thought he recognised.

It was actually his fey blood which permitted his ears such acute hearing, had he but known it, but Lucius was dubious about the fey nature of the Malfoys. It had troubled him with regards to the pure blooded ideas he had imbibed from Rabastan and Rodolphus, though he was beginning to consider asking his father more about it. However, he did not realise that this was why he managed to recognise the voice of a Slytherin first year. In fact the voice was that of the first muggleborn in Slytherin, and Lucius, working with Narcissa to find families to adopt half bloods and muggleborn had become acquainted with much of the first, as well as with the Greengrasse gang of the second, and young Avery had attached himself to the older boy as an unofficial fag, running errands for Lucius.

Lucius was not happy about one of his fellow snakes being hurt, and barged into a classroom to find Mulciber and McNair cutting the child's robes off her, not caring if the cutting hex went through to skin.

"You should not be disgracing the robes of House Slytherin, mudblood trash!" Mulciber was saying. "Naked you will stand before our Lord and repent that you tried to steal wizarding powers!"

"I haven't stolen anything you big bully and you're stealing from me by cutting my robes!" the child piped.

Lucius grinned. She had spirit! However, he had heard how Severus Snape had been abducted, and stopped grinning quickly, as Mulciber held a scarf. He strode into the room, firing off stunners at the two boys.

He then grinned nastily at Mulciber, who was touching the scarf, kicked McNair until he was also touching it, and said,

"Go."

They disappeared.

"Well, well, no imagination," said Lucius. "Nicely handled, Cubitt. Here," he pulled off his own robe, and wrapped it round the little girl. Having heard what the Marauders had done to the Ravenclaw bullies, Lucius had taken to wearing black trousers and sweater under his school robes. He had no desire to be caught showing his underwear.

"Oh Malfoy! Thank you!" said Kate Cubitt. "I believe I owe you a life debt."

Lucius was about to disclaim this when he considered what Voldemort might do with a prebubescent muggleborn child, and he shuddered.

"You know, Kate, I think you might," he said, seriously. "But as it's acknowledged, you don't have to worry about it. I think we need to report this to the head."

"Where did they go?" asked Kate, slipping a confiding hand into his.

It was shockingly pleasant to be so trusted by a confiding little brat, even … hell, the kid was Slytherin and she had Gaunt markings on her heritance reading.

"They went to wherever they planned to take you," said Lucius.

"To their dark lord? Will he be angry they don't have me?"

"Oh, I hope so," said Lucius.

OoOoOo

Tiberius was not entirely happy to see Lucius Malfoy, but when the boy said,

"Please, sir, Kate is hurt, but I trust you more than I trust Nurse Pomfrey," he was busy reassessing the boy.

"Who did this?" he asked, removing the wrapped robe and beginning to heal Kate.

"Mulciber and McNair," said Lucius, who was still being held by the hand tightly by the diminutive golden haired witch.

"I take it you neutralised them?"

"Stunners, sir; and they had a portkey, they were going to send her to Lord Losealot. I, er, decided to see if the same word activated it as the one which took Mr. Prince."

"Did it?"

"Yes, sir," said Lucius, in some trepidation.

"Oh, well, saves me expelling them," said Tiberius. "You had better write a full report and append a blood signature to it, invoking your magic, that it is a true and fair account. If that is what they intended for her …."

"She has acknowledged a life debt," said Lucius.

"You know where that usually leads, don't you?"

"Yes, sir, but … but I am not perturbed by it. To be honest, I think it will be good for our bloodline, only how the devil do I explain it to … to muggle parents?"

"You don't. Just … let things take their course as they will. I'll find a job for you in the school when you leave school so she is not strained by distance."

"Please, sir, I know something about life debts, we did them in class, and … and I read up about them too," said Kate.

"So you know that often this can lead to marriage? Does this trouble you?" asked Tiberius.

"Being potentially married to the most handsome boy I've ever seen, who has been so kind? Well, not hardly, sir," said Kate. "Only I can't see my dad taking it lying down, if Mr. Malfoy wishes to follow that through, which he might not," she blushed, "I will need to explain to him about the importance of purity in betrothals."

"I think if we are moving in that direction, you should be calling me 'Lucius'," said Lucius. "I don't know you well enough yet, Kate, but I intend to do so. I've had a lot of epiphanies over the last year or so. And a few long talks with Salazar Slytherin's portrait."

"Lucius, I am proud of you," said Tiberius. "I thought you were an unmitigated little shit when I first knew you …. Oops, my deepest apologies, Miss Cubitt, the swear word slipped out."

Kate giggled.

"I hear worse from muggles," she said.

"That's no excuse for me," said Tiberius."

"I was … what you said," said Lucius. "You opened my eyes to how I was being used."

"And that's why I'm proud of you; you listened, and did not firmly shut your eyes again. You've done very well."

"Thank you, sir," said Lucius.

"I am re-instating your prefect badge for this," said Tiberius. "I think you are due public recognition for your hard work."

 **Chapter 11**

"Mr. Malfoy, well met," the Marauders bowed and curtseyed in a body. Severus was the spokesman. "We heard how nicely you handled Mulciber and McNair on behalf of Miss Cubitt. We wanted to express our respect."

"Also our respect for you escaping from being made into a class one, grade O twerp by the Deatheaters," said Petunia.

"Miss Evans-Prince does not express that quite as eloquently as Mr. Prince would have done, but the sentiment goes for all of us," said Sirius.

"Like, groovy," said James, who was promptly poked by all the female Marauders for that lapse into mugglese.

"Er, thank you," said Lucius. "I … er, I'm looking forward to seeing the new all-House common room; Miss Cubitt has expressed a desire to sew on the sewing machines."

"Oh good, another one to help teach those who don't know how to use them," said Petunia. "Please convey our respects to Miss Cubitt, and ask if she is willing to give some time to teaching."

"Yes, I shall," said Lucius.

"Which family has Miss Cubitt accepted for protection?" asked Severus.

"The Greengrasse family," said Lucius. "The scion of House Greengrass has arranged for his father to visit the Cubitts to explain about life debts; I am obliged to him. And to knowing that the head of House Greengrasse has warded Kate's parents' house."

Severus nodded.

"Mr. Greengrasse is held to be very competent with runes and warding," he said. "If Dave is anything to go by, he's also quite down to earth and would help you to approach the Cubitt parents with regards to a formal betrothal if the life-debt goes to its logical conclusion, but I would strongly advise, Scion Malfoy, that you learn more about muggles as well."

"Kate … Miss Cubitt… has done her best to explain," said Lucius.

"Scion Malfoy, I think it's time to bury the hatchet entirely since you've proved yourself to have cast iron ones to admit to being wrong. We can probably help you a lot more than a kiddy of eleven, no disrespect to Miss Cubitt intended, who has only experienced one way of life, and has no idea how to explain the things that she takes for granted. I've grown up half-blood, and my pact-sisters have been associated with my magical family long enough to know what things wizards don't know."

"I would be happy to take your instruction, Scion Prince," said Lucius. "I would be happy to make you free with my given name."

"Thank you, Lucius; and I think I speak for my fellows in making you free with ours," said Severus, gravely.

Tiberius had written to the parents of Mulciber and McNair, reporting that they had been seen using a portkey to leave the castle, and so far as he was concerned, if there was not a good explanation forthcoming, their parents might consider that such truancy meant that they were duly expelled.

The portkey had been provided by one of those parents, no doubt, in order to present Tom Riddle with the present of a muggle born child to murder, and if the younger Messrs. Mulciber and McNair had been killed instead, Tiberius was not about to lose any sleep over it. He alerted the DMLE in any case, that two boys were truanting with a portkey.

It should see their fathers having to answer a few uncomfortable questions, in any case, which might be amusing. Amusing for Tiberius, anyway. He doubted if the older Deatheaters would find it funny.

Tiberius also sent Eileen on a mission to Gringott's, to ask to purchase as much broken silver jewellery, muggle was fine, as possible, with a finder's fee to a goblin employed to seek it out for as much purity as possible.

The goblins of Gringotts were no fools.

Tiberius Prince had a cure for lycanthropy, which he was offering to others; but there were those werewolves who would not want a cure, and now Mr. Prince might be considered a target. As he presumably had a plan, the goblins were more than happy to assist in anything which would reduce the threat to society. War was bad for business, and nobody had ever thought that a pureblood supremacist movement was ever likely to be friendly to goblins. The goblins enthusiastically tore apart sequestered vaults from which any gold had already been removed, but successive ministries had rarely bothered to take silver in fines of anyone stripped of their wealth.

The twelve goblins who turned up with bags of silver took Tiberius' breath away.

"That's amazing, Trazgorn," he said to the Prince account manager who had come with the silver.

"Mr. Prince, if you can destroy werewolves who do not want the cure, you remove one of the dark lord's terror offences," said Trazgorn. "Please consider this a donation from Gringotts to the war effort."

"Please convey my thanks and respects to the director," said Tiberius. "Dare I ask where it came from?"

Trazgorn gave a feral grin.

"Grindelwald for one had an account at Gringotts, which was seized by the ministry, as well as sundry others over the centuries, and ministers are fascinated by gold, not silver or copper. We have left the sickles, but if you require more, there will be more."

"Trazgorn, I am overwhelmed."

"Mr. Prince, you have always been courteous to goblins. We know how courteous the followers of the dark lord would be."

"Hmm, yes, quite. Please pass to other goblins that Scion Malfoy has coined the name 'Lord Losealot' for Tom Riddle. And …. You may wish to pass to the director that it is not impossible that his followers might have one of his horcruces held in their vaults. I don't know if you are permitted to access them in search of such dark magic?"

Trazgorn's face was dark with fury.

"One of? He has several? Rest assured, Mr. Prince, we are permitted to access accounts we believe hold anything of that kind. We will be searching, and we thank you for the information."

"Thank you for searching. I have a way to destroy them."

Trazgorn grinned.

"So do we. May I ask your method?"

"We have managed to persuade the basilisk Salazar Slytherin placed in the Chamber of Secrets to give venom to destroy them. We have some of his descendents in the castle."

The Goblin's ears went up.

"It is true, then? And it is not inimitable? Did it not kill a girl?"

Tiberius made a quick decision.

"Yes, and in being used to cause her death to make a horcrux, the basilisk wept, and his tears helped restore her to her body, as she was a ghost," he said.

"You are a powerful ritual wizard, Mr. Prince," said Trazgorn, in profound respect. "And plainly of the light to consider renewing life."

"We think the ritual had also the beneficial effect of destroying that horcrux," said Tiberius. Trazgorn frowned in thought.

"I am no expert, but it is sound theory, I will speak with those who know more with regards to that," he said. "I am glad we have decided to back you. I feel more certain now that your efforts will be successful."

"Thank you, and all those willing to oppose Tom Riddle," said Tiberius.

Tobias was going to have a lot of cartridges, and in the meantime had set up a gun club for the school, which Tiberius had thought the best way of getting hold of more than one gun for his surprising new ally.

The gun club consisted of the Marauders and their friends, those of the muggle born who were not scared of guns, and, surprisingly, Lucius Malfoy who was ready to learn any skill which would get rid of a paranoid megalomaniac. There were also a few muggle parents, housed in the castle for their own safety whilst adoption negotiations went on, who were willing to join in.

Tiberius was glad.

He did not think there would be much delay between another setback and an attack of some sort, and Voldemort was unlikely to commit his own forces – yet. He was more likely to talk Fenrir Greyback into punishing the man who had taken away the wolf from children the evil werewolf had made.

OoOoOo

Had Tiberius been privy to the thoughts of Tom Marvolo Riddle, he could not have guessed better what his plans might be. Words like 'psychopath' might not be known in the wizarding world, but Tiberius had dark wizards in history with whom to draw parallels, even if he described the behaviour as 'dancing with doxies in the upper storey'. The werewolf Fenrir Greyback had a grudge, and so did Voldemort, and the latter preferred not to expose himself. His legitimate prey of muggle parents had largely disappeared after the first warning attacks for the purpose of intimidating other muggleborn children in Hogwarts, and one had to assume they had been taken to the castle.

It was a reasonable assumption, and true as far as it went; until the rapid mass adoptions had seen pure blood families who did not subscribe to the notion of following Riddle putting up wards which meant the Death Eaters could not even find their prey. Even Orion and Walburga Black had come on board for that; learning that Riddle was a bloodliar and that his father was a muggle had even made the rather rabid Walburga turn her coat, and congratulate her sons for helping persuade other school Houses back to the old ways. Regulus kept very quiet about having had his friend Adam adopted into the Prince family, but recommended others. Most Hufflepuffs came under the protection of the Bones family, whose three junior members, Amelia, Edgar and Paul, had not long left school and were remembered by some of the older ones as much loved prefects. The Prewetts volunteered for Gryffindors, and only Gryffindors. This was no real surprise after the debacle of the failed betrothal between Narcissa Black and Fabian Prewett the year before.

"Makes me want to corrupt the two firsties they've taken on by teaching them Parseltongue," said Severus.

"Sev, mate, that's thoroughly devious," said Sirius.

"Now then!" Narcissa scolded. "You know how upset I got, and they are just babes."

"It's what's stopping me," said Severus. "I note we've not had any adoptions in Ravenclaw outside of Flitters taking on a couple; Lucius stole two families for Malfoy, and managed to persuade his father it was a victory to infiltrate Ravenclaw."

"You have to admit, he is clever," said Remus. "He's not having Narcissa back, though."

Severus laughed.

"He has himself an adoring firstie," he said. "And actually I think young Kate Cubitt will be the making of Lucius."

"And it won't do her any harm either," said Sirius. "We stick to Mr. this and Mrs. that, but in formal surroundings she'll be Lady Malfoy. As Tiberius is Lord Prince."

"It's a bit outmoded," said Severus. "Who you are ought to matter more than names. I mean, there's also a Lord Parkinson, and he can't talk and drool at the same time without getting confused."

"Well that breeds true," said Narcissa. "if Laeticia Parkinson was any more moronic, Professor Sprout would have to water her weekly. I don't recall anything about her brother other than the fact that he looked like a pug and smelled like a badly cared for crup."

"Probably has all the social graces of both, then," said James. "I think I met him once when Dad was impressing on me my various social duties. Mouth permanently set at half mast, mourning the loss of the few brains he was born with when they trickled out of his nose."

"I keep telling you, I do snide around here," said Severus. "Masterly summation though, if accurate, and I haven't met him."

"You haven't missed much," said James.

OoOoOo

Tiberius had figured out that the probably time of the attack would tactically be on the traditional Hogsmead weekend before Samhain. However, that weekend was a waning moon; the full moon fell the weekend before, on Saturday over Sunday 22nd October, and there was a quidditch match scheduled for the Saturday. It would be an ideal time to attack.

Well, Tiberius planned to have his new gun club volunteers in the upper stands of the bleachers, and went out to sort out emergency entrances into the volume below the stands, with warding against lycanthropes on them, and a series of emergency portkeys to take groups of children directly back into the school. There was nothing wrong with being paranoid. The only fault lay in not being paranoid enough.

 **Chapter 12**

" _Dear Narcissa,_

 _I wanted to apologise sincerely for my outburst last year. I'm deeply involved with Auror training right now, with Gideon and with Amelia Bones from Hufflepuff. I've had time to think and to be deeply ashamed of my actions in leaving you in Hogsmead like that. I have also talked to my twin, and to Amelia, and they feel I was over-reacting about a language. I've also had access to more books on dark arts, which include treatises on Parseltongue and Parselmagic, which state categorically that although Parselmagic is not of itself dark, it might be used to enhance dark rituals."_

"Parselmagic? You want to talk to Sal about that," said Severus, excitedly.

"I do," said Narcissa, who was reading to the Marauders and their two supporters what Fabian Prewett had written to her. They had also invited Lucius and Kate to this informal and extended meeting. "He's a stuffed robe, but I think I will forgive him as he seems to be thinking, finally, instead of letting prejudice speak for him."

"About time," said Sirius.

"Yes," his cousin agreed. "Anyway, he goes on to say, ' _I am aware that I made an awful fool of myself.'"_

"No shit, Sherlock," said Severus.

"What?" James looked confused.

"Sherlock Holmes, a famous muggle detective, well, he's fictional, but they based a lot of police procedure on what was written about him. I'll lend you the books," said Petunia.

"Aw, not more work, Tuney?" whined James.

"Tisn't work, you big sap," said Petunia. "It's entertainment, it's stories. You did say you liked muggle stories."

"Oh, if it's stories, that's fine," James brightened.

"Maybe we should have readings in the new common room for people who want to learn more muggle things," said Narcissa.

"You'll love Sherlock Holmes, Lucius!" said Kate. "It's all about using observation and intelligence, and you're so clever, I bet you'd be a great detective!"

"Er, maybe," said Lucius, having the grace to blush. "Well, I might decide to be an Auror, why not?" he added defensively.

"Go for it, Lucius, mate," said Peter. "You can be anything you want to be, you just have to know yourself, and go for it."

Lucius regarded him thoughtfully.

"That's actually quite profound," he said.

"Our Peter can be, at times," said Remus. "Only can we get on? It'll be teatime in a minute and I heard a rumour that there was treacle tart."

"Sorry," said Narcissa. " _I believed what I had been told about Parseltongue and I have insulted you greatly, and I wanted to know if you wished to resume the betrothal. I would not want to dishonour you, and Amelia says I should ask. Anyway, I hope you will forgive me and have no hard feelings._

 _Yours, Fabian Prewett."_

"It sounds as though he's sweet on this Amelia," said Severus.

"That's what I thought," said Narcissa. "Amelia is nice, she's the same age as the Prewett twins, and nominally friendly with their sister Molly, who's married to Iggy's cousin, Arthur, poor man. When Fabian threw one at me last year, I thought he was channelling his inner sister."

"I thought he was just acting like a little purebred girl whose birthday had been cancelled, due to lack of ice cream myself," said Sirius.

"Well, that too, but I shan't be unhappy not to be Molly Weasely's sister-in-law," said Narcissa. "I'll write back and thank him for his apology, and tell him that I am sure he won't jump to conclusions in the future, and that I think that trying to resume the betrothal would be a bad idea, and that perhaps he might be happier with Amelia. I'll tell him I'll dance at his wedding if I'm invited."

"Yes, that would be a public way of showing that there are no hard feelings," said Lucius. "Busy day tomorrow, with quidditch and an anticipated attack. Good job it's Ravenclaw vs Hufflepuff, I want to be on overwatch and shoot me some werewolves. There was an article in the 'Prophet' that our revered headmaster has invented a cure, so no werewolf has any excuse to remain one, so you kids don't have to worry that any of them are perfectly nice in human form. Why are you all laughing at me?"

"Because I was the first werewolf cured, and he invented it for me," said Remus.

"Yeah, he used to be a werewolf but he's all right NOOOOOOOOWWW" said Sirius.

Lily poked him.

"Aren't you ever serious?" she asked.

"Yes, all the time, I was given the name at birth," said Sirius.

Lily rolled her eyes.

OoOoOo

Fortunately for the vigilant watchers at the top of the stands, the quidditch match was pretty pedestrian. This didn't stop many of the muggle fathers who had volunteered as sharp shooters from gawking surreptitiously; this was the first time for most of them, as they had no idea what sports their children played. Tobias dismissed it as 'kids knocking about,' but then Eileen had introduced him to professional quidditch, and he was a follower of the Wimborne Wasps, so used to flashier play.

The first howl from the forbidden forest, however, concentrated the minds of the most fascinated of the fathers. They, after all, wanted their children alive to continue to play their odd sport.

"Incoming!" one of the fathers called.

"Hold your fire," Tobias had a carrying voice. "Let's get them at a closer range and get maximum silver in them."

Tobias, aided by Severus, had done some test firings and determined that they wanted the wolves inside 40 yards of the quidditch pitch for each shot to be most effective; the further away the wolves were, the more the shot would spread, and though any silver pellet should cause some problems, Tiberius had been adamant that he wanted dead wolves, not sick wolves. Silver, being much lighter than lead, limited the normal range.

There was panic from the children on the stands, and Madam McGonagall, who had been refereeing, was calling for calm, and an orderly evacuation. The prefects had been warned that this might be necessary, and were largely keeping calm and moving children under the bleachers. An Irish Hufflepuff prefect was adjuring his House seeker to 'just leave the feckin' broom and get the bejazus out of here'.

"If anything happens to your brooms, they will be replaced." The headmaster's sonorous finally got the reluctant players to put their brooms down and evacuate. Tiberius would provide for new brooms if need be out of his own pocket; brooms could be replaced, lives could not, but for some of these young people, their parents had gone without to make sure they had as good a broom as possible.

The 'artillery corps' tried to ignore the nonsense of those being evacuated, and waited with good discipline. Most of the muggle fathers had done National Service in their youth, and Tobias had been a sergeant and had the air of command to have them automatically fall into a disciplined unit. Tiberius absently reflected than a magical equivalent of the Cadet Corps for the sixth form wouldn't come amiss for those youths hoping to go on for auror training. Maybe Tobias would accept a position helping to lead it, teaching drill and PT even if he could not teach wand discipline.

Meanwhile the wolves came closer, howling their song of terror to freeze their little victims, Fenrir Greyback to the fore, rejoicing that their prey were too terrified to leave the killing zone of the quidditch pitch. He could not see that the children, year by year, were being ushered into chambers under the stands, where portkeys were activated to take them back to the castle. Tiberius had worked with Hogwarts herself to permit this, and each portkey was a part of the castle, a painting, or a decorative stone, or a candle sconce. It enabled the castle to make sure that no two groups landed in the same place.

And the wolves came closer.

Fenrir Greyback howled a howl of triumph.

It was cut short with a horrid gurgling as the first barrage hit him and those in front, almost challenging their alpha. A quick pumping and the second wave died, and then the guns were being swapped for a second gun each whilst a few volunteer elves reloaded the first ones.

Regulus was unable to accept his second gun; he was being quietly sick, but his friend, Adam, kept firing grimly. Adam knew that as a mudblood, as some called him, he would be most at risk.

"This is for my parents!" he declared, shrilly. Tiberius noted that with so much adrenaline, the boy would need the infirmary after this, when he came down it would be a heavy crash.

For his own part, he preferred spells to deal with werewolves, and was spraying them with the aguamenti spell, transfiguring the water to rock oil as he did so, petra oleum, and then casting a few fire spells. Burning wolves lost their singleminded drive to find and bite prey.

And then it was like shooting fish in a barrel, and the shooters were mopping up. Tobias and two volunteers, with Tiberius and Auror Shacklebolt as magical backup, went round the werewolves to check that they were really all dead. If they were back into human form, they were probably dead, but a stinging hex into the leg would soon prove if anyone was faking. The muggles used makeshift bayonets on their shotguns, which worked just as well.

And then the youngsters who had killed for the first time must be taken to the infirmary to be sick, to cry, to cling to each other, and to be dosed with calming potions and dreamless sleep potions. There would be a few of those who had not been involved who would need the same, werewolves were a common enough boggart, and might become so for children previously unaffected. Not that they had seen much, but imagination could be scarier than reality.

OoOoOo

"What do we do about it?" asked Narcissa, of Tiberius. "Do we publicise that the werewolves are dead, and rub Lord Losealot's nose in it, or do we just use digging spells and they disappear?"

"I'm inclined to make them disappear," said Tiberius. "The majority of the children saw nothing, and I am inclined to make a speech congratulating them on handling a safety drill very well."

"Brilliant," said Narcissa. "I'll warn the others that there were no werewolves, you used spells for the howls for verisimilitude, of course?"

"Yes, well thought of," said Tiberius. "It will allay fears, and I will warn them that because Lord Losealot is at large, we shall have more unexpected drills."

Narcissa nodded.

That should prevent any owls being sent home telling of a werewolf attack, and so the news would take longer to leak out."

Voldemort would have no idea what had happened to his werewolves; and that should make him very jumpy. Turning the terror back on the terrorist was sweet.

 **Chapter 13**

The school as a whole was thoroughly disgruntled to have had their quidditch match disrupted for a nasty fright, which had turned out to be only a drill, but as Madam McGonagall pointed out, even if Ravenclaw's seeker had caught the snitch it would only have been a consolation prize since they were down some twenty five goals. This was undeniable, and the phrase 'saved by the werewolf' enjoyed a brief vogue to indicate a timely event preventing bad luck.

The Hogsmead weekend passed as quietly as any such weekend ever might, with the armed muggles volunteering to stay and patrol, just in case. The Marauders were not interested in the shenanigans of the older ones, even the older Marauders; Narcissa was not short of supplies, and had no boyfriend old enough to escort her in any case. Phil and Myrtle took no interest in the behaviour of their peer group, and Phil declared most of the excited teens to be parasitised by wrackspurts. Lucius was happy to knock about with the Marauders, learning more about Muggles. The new common room was very successful, and Eileen had found a large number of sewing machines cheap in junk shops, hand-cranked, treadle, and one which she suggested might be take apart, and a hand cranked handle replace the electric motor, since it had cams to enable different embroidery stitches. This was well within Tobias's capability, and he managed to correspond amicably with Eileen over the matter.

"This is very difficult," said Lucius, who had taken some time to go into Hogsmeade to meet Mr. and Mrs. Cubitt, escorted by Mr. Greengrasse.

"You're rather old to be hitting on a kid Kate's age," said Mr. Cubitt, frowning.

"I would never hit Kate!" Lucius was shocked. "She is special!"

Mr. Cubitt blinked.

"Ah, a slight divergence in the language, I fancy," he said. "I meant, to be, er, romancing her."

"She's too young to think about romance," said Lucius.

"But not to think about marriage? Isn't that putting the cart before the horse?" said Mr. Cubitt. "We were hoping she would meet someone in University and marry at about 25. But you wizards don't have universities."

"We have apprenticeships instead," said Lucius, who had a hazy idea about what universities were, through talking with Kate. "However, I can't see why a more formal after-school education shouldn't be available. I need to know more, and perhaps I might then ask a few other people to help me finance something of the kind. It would make sure more people could learn more."

"Just like that? Have you any idea how much it would cost?" asked Mrs. Cubitt.

"Around 100,000 galleons to be fully self-supporting I should think," said Lucius. "I could probably find it from my own income, but I want to invest that, and I'd rather like to get my father on board to the idea, and I've also got some ambitions, having seen the … your … non-magical sewing machines that an education in practical skills wouldn't go amiss for those who can't follow up a highly technical magical education. Just because Mr. Prince has a cure for squibs doesn't mean they are all very good at magic, and there are families who do not attend Hogwarts. If we want to have a healthy economy we need education in other skills."

"Well, you certainly seem to be ambitious," said Mr. Cubitt. "But can you answer my question about marriage?"

"Oh, yes, sorry," said Lucius. "Has Mr. Greengrasse explained to you about life debts?"

"Yes, and Kate wrote a quote she found in a book, but it seems a big step to marriage," said Mrs. Cubitt.

"Ah, I wonder if there was no mention made of a soul-bond?" said Lucius. "By your looks, I'd say not. To Mr. Greengrasse, who has no knowledge of muggle ways it was too obvious to mention, and to Kate, it's not something she yet knows about, I suspect."

"Talk fast, young man," said Mr. Cubitt.

"It's simple enough," Lucius shrugged. "When a wizard or witch, unless belonging to any organisation which swears to protect and serve, like Aurors do, saves a life, there is an exchange of magical signature in that, because magic touches at a more profound level than we can see." He frowned in thought. "Actually, some people can see it; my cousin, Phil, told me if I abused the soul-binding he'd knock my block off, which as he's a bit weedy was pretty brave of him. He sees things like that. But he's a bit weird."

"My dear Mr. Malfoy, to us, you are all a bit weird," said Mrs. Cubitt. Mr. Greengrasse had impressed upon the couple that they must be formal.

Lucius coloured.

"I suppose if there is a chance we are to be family, I should invite you to call me 'Lucius'," he said. "I feel a bond to Kate. It … I am coming to terms with having prejudice swept away. I have believed until recently that … that first generation magic was inferior. I am learning that this is an error. It has given me somewhat mixed feelings, but I am not such a fool as to ignore a blood debt, even though the effects on me would be less than if Kate denied it. Which she has not. Those who do can be plagued by bad dreams, and even become ill, as their magical core wants to accept a joining, but their mind is revolting against it. It …" he seized inspiration from a muggle medical technique which horrified and fascinated him, "It is like rejecting an organ in the body."

"That can kill you," Mr. Cubitt said.

"So can fighting a life-debt," said Lucius. "And I don't know if romance will grow, but a betrothal is more about protection and practicality. It can be renounced when Kate is older if she wishes it, and I'll get the reputation as a flirt, but I'm rich enough that any witch is going to ignore a reputation like that to have the chance to fondle my gold. I want to marry for love, but I know at some point I must marry for an heir, and I'd as soon it was someone I at least like. And have a chance to feel more. And it adds another layer of protection if someone is going to piss off the Malfoy family, which is traditionalist, as well as the Greengrass family, which has neutral tendencies. Also when I am 17, I can write a will and leave my property to Kate, rather than have it revert through several tortuous routes to a dark family like the Parkinsons, who are lickspittles of the Lestranges. It's politics, Mr. Cubitt, but politics that have the relevance of keeping your little girl safe. I have her life in my keeping. It's up to me to continue to keep her safe, and as I'm going to be opposing Lord Losealot, she might just need my grandmother's legacy to get the lot of you out of England at the worst."

"Things are that bad?" Mr. Cubitt was shocked. Mr. Greengrasse had explained a lot to him, the reason why the family needed adopting, but it had not sunk home how much risk there was.

"Potentially," Lucius shrugged. "When the previous headmaster was the one who was trusted to win against Tommy, then I'd say many of us were doomed. Our current headmaster is a lot cleverer and more cunning."

"What I don't understand," said Mrs. Cubitt, "is why it has anything to do with a headmaster and a school at all. Isn't it the job of the magical police?"

"It should be," said Lucius, "But a lot of people in the ministry are bought and paid for. Tom Riddle began recruiting when he was at school, has tried to get a post as teacher to continue that, but also meets covertly with the disaffected in this village, the way we are meeting, and so his influence is in the school. Amongst those like the two boys who tried to kidnap Kate."

"What happened to them?" demanded Mr. Cubitt.

Lucius shrugged.

"Last I heard, they were back with their families, still twitching from prolonged use of the cruciatus curse, first by Tom Riddle, and then by their fathers for failing," he said. "The tyranny of a man who uses torture on his allies and minions is out of the understanding of any reasonable person. I plan to oppose him."

"Very well, we will consider this, but I want to talk it over with Kate at Christmas," said Mr. Cubitt. "You wizards get betrothed very young."

Lucius smiled; it was a rather mirthless smile.

"I was betrothed before I was born to Andromeda Black," he said. "She chose to marry a muggleborn. There was some thought of marrying me to her sister, Narcissa. Narcissa did not want to marry me, and though we now have a tentative friendship, I am glad. Her parents do listen somewhat to her wishes. It's a way of making alliance, but to he honest I don't think it helps bloodlines at all."

OoOoOo

 _Dear Father,_

 _Really? You would disown me? When you have plenty of mistresses who aren't just muggleborn but downright muggles? How hypocritical is that?_

 _Hasn't it yet occurred to you that this could be a fantastic opportunity and a political statement? Especially if you throw around such phrases as 'first generation regained magic' since it's people like you poking muggles over the centuries which create bloodlines in muggles which, if two of them cross paths, throw up offspring. You'll follow any of your half-blood bastards who are magical, but you'll lose track of any who are not, and that's a mistake, because that's a bloodline to nurture, to make sure to introduce to other muggle bloodlines with wizarding blood and then to have a pool of regained-magic people with hybrid vigor to bring back into our families. How many generations is it since Malfoys managed more than one son, no daughters to bargain with? At least five. And that means we are weak. Mr. Prince says 'infinite diversity in infinite combinations enriches the world.' And that means we should see about being less inbred. Just because he can cure squibs doesn't mean that we should be complacent about producing more of them in pureblood families. We have introduced hybrid vigor by marrying high fae, Veeli, Huldrvolk and others of the same kind, and really, how pure bred is that? As well marry goblins, actually, as they are of the same folk, though I suspect the Goblin Nation might militate against a treaty marriage with one of their daughters. But to save the family and increase our standing and wealth in the face of Tommy Riddle, I would even consider that. And Kate is a good girl who is willingly learning about our world and customs._

 _Your objections are foolish, and counter to what we stand for – high status in the wizarding world. We can change, adapt, overcome and thrive, or we can cling to outmoded thinking, half-understood ideals from a primitive age when heritance was less well understood, and go under like the cavemen we shall be._

 _Your loving and dutiful son,_

 _Lucius._

Meanwhile, Narcissa idly asked the portrait of Salazar Slytherin,

"Where did the name Hogwarts come from, anyway? It's a bit … well …"

"It should be Hogge's Worts, Miss Black," said Salazar, frowning. "Linguistic drift is responsible for many travesties and it's not made better by the pub being named the Hog's Head by some wag in the thirteenth century."

"I think I'm going to need more explanation," said Narcissa.

"It was built by a man named Roger, the Shrubber," said Salazar. "He was more noted for his gardening ability than his masonry, so all his friends teased him that he was building supports for his beans and peas. Now back then, Hogge was the most common hypochoristic – pet name to you – for Roger, and worts is an old name for vegetables so Hogge's Worts was the name of the castle when we bought it, long before it was as extensive as it now is. We liked the location, on a ley line node, and it probably only held up because Roger was a muggleborn wizard of more power than intellect, and he used it instinctively."

"I suppose that makes sense," said Narcissa, quickly thanking the portrait and going off to share the information with the others. Salazar had already come across with some suggestions for finding other portraits and this, too, she wished to share.

 **Chapter 14**

The time had come for the choosing of partners for the Yule Ball again, though with the dancing classes Tiberius had instituted there was a little less panicking.

"Narcissa, are we going to go together, on the understanding that I can't take a firstie and you have no romantic interest?" asked Lucius.

"Yes, I guess, but I need to check with Remus first," said Narcissa. "He has a crush on me, and he's such a sweet boy, I'd hate to upset him, and to be honest, when we're both adult, if he still feels the same way, I could go a lot further and do worse."

"Well how about that," said Lucius. "I'm not trying to steal you away."

"And Kate should be made a Marauder," said Narcissa.

"Yes, those other brats will protect her well," said Lucius.

Kate was duly inducted as a Marauder, and Narcissa drew Remus aside.

"You didn't really want to go to the ball, did you?" she said.

"No, but I will if you need me to," said Remus.

"I thought I could go, as a friend only, with Lucius, because he can't take Kate," said Narcissa.

Remus considered this.

"If I was still a wolf I think I'd be howling inside, but I can see it makes sense," he said. "Besides, I'm not really old enough to know what to do about things yet."

"You will be," said Narcissa.

oOoOo

"What are we going to do about Rolanda Hooch?" it was a question posed by Petunia to the other Gryffindor Marauders. They involved Frank, Alice and Peter as it was a House matter more than a Marauder matter. They did not ask Ignatius Weasley.

"She's a menace as quiddich prefect and even James and I are sick of her," grumbled Sirius. "When she was just a beater last year, I thought she was an okay sort of person, and I admired her, now I want to hit her on the head with a bludger."

"And the firsties hide when she comes along to chivy people out into the cold to play quidditch whether they want to or not. We won't have anyone coming up to go into the team if she puts people off like this," said James. "I love quidditch but really? Five thirty am practises? Bad enough that we go out to run, which, by the way I've noticed helps me hold up shield charms longer before I get puffed, but quidditch every morning and every evening is going to make us tired and stale. And it's dark and how can we properly practise in the dark?"

"Obviously we need to prank her so hard she's aware of the disapproval we all feel, but in such a way the reason is obvious," said Severus.

"Maybe we can stop the brooms from flying," said Lily. "Or you could all pretend they don't fly."

"Brewer's droop," said Severus.

"You said what, Sev, mate?" asked Sirius.

Severus blushed.

"Well my da has given up drinking but when he was, if he wanted to … you know … with Mum, sometimes he … couldn't, and he said it was brewer's droop. Because …"

"We get the idea, mate," said James. "So we want a curse on the brooms to make them sort of wilt as soon as they are touched?"

"Yes, that's more or less what I was thinking, dead from over-use," said Severus.

"Getting past the protections on the brooms will be the trick," said Petunia.

"That's why I was considering treating them with a potion, only we'd better have an antidote ready as well so that we can cure them if anyone gets really irate," said Severus. "And just the Gryffindor brooms."

"What about the older members of the team?" asked Lily.

"James and I will talk to them," said Sirius. "I wager they're not keen on so much practise, some of them have serious exams, and even if they don't, they don't like how she upsets the younger ones."

"And she is such a kind person if anyone is hurt, it's not doing her reputation any good," agreed Petunia.

James and Sirius spoke to a selection of older players, having managed to achieve their dream to play for the Gryffindor team themselves.

"If you ask me, she's opened herself up to be a fit subject to be Marauded," said Malachi Wood, one of the beaters. "Passion is good; but there is nothing in life more important than quiddich and she is making us too stale. Even me."

With the team likely to play along, the Marauders went into action, brewing firmly in what had once been Myrtle's loo. House painting brushes were used to apply it, overnight, by Remus and Severus, under James' invisibility cloak, so all the team members could truthfully declare that they had done nothing, and because they were the best at sneaking.

And at the morning practice, the team picked up their brooms which obligingly drooped in the middle.

Rolanda had hysterics.

"Well that proves we're as brittle as a team as the brooms," said Wood. "If someone as sensible as you can have hysterics, Hooch, because the brooms are as exhausted as we are. I'm going back to bed."

"Yeah," the rest of the team nodded sagely.

Rolanda was left sobbing impotently and trying each broom in turn, until finally she gave up and ran to find Madam McGonagall. As soon as she had gone, Remus and Severus, who had been holding their sides to stop themselves laughing, snuck out from beneath the cloak in order to restore the status quo.

Professor McGonagall was not impressed to have been got up far too early to inspect perfectly functional brooms, and to have the rest of the team swear that they had not even been out of their beds and apologising for sleeping in because they were too tired.

"I'm growing, I'm sorry, Madam McGonagall," sighed James, knuckling his eyes. "It's so hard coping with fourteen quidditch practices a week and homework, I think I'm going to have to cry off the team."

"Fourteen? Miss Hooch, whit are ye thinkin av?" demanded the Scots professor, horrified. "And whit's more, I've aye heard wee bairns in the firrrrst, complaining that they've come tae hate quidditch for bein' sair chivvied intae it, and I was expecting it tae be some wee sumpf in the second, but I'm aye changing ma thochts on that forebye."

The rest of the team slunk off as Rolanda Hooch was given a thoroughgoing and very Scots tirade on the rights and responsibilities of a quidditch captain. The thoughtfully arranged sobbing testament of the two firsties where she could overhear it the previous evening had required very little bribery to accomplish. The mission had been accomplished, and the Marauders celebrated by learning Severus' new spell, and all the prefects of every house had impressively billowing robes every time they farted for a full forty eight hours.

The end of term came, as it so often did, faster than anyone expected, and the ball went as well as might be anticipated. As Lucius and Narcissa chose to sit out most of the dances while Lucius ran a commentary on the lack of expertise of the other dancers, once he and Narcissa had demonstrated their own considerable competence, Narcissa had to hold up a shield charm on him as his comments solicited several hexes. Lucius thought it hilarious. Speech being free, so long as he stayed clear of anything too inflammatory, McGonagall had to look on while some of her lions were given detentions to serve in the New Year for some quite nasty hexes.

"Ye're no helping matters, Mr. Malfoy," she hissed.

"On the contrary, Madam McGonagall," said Lucius, with a beautiful bow. "I'm helping them to learn to take criticism with stoicism, which they will find in the real world of work once free from these hallowed walls, where hexing colleagues won't be taken well. Besides, I've been insulted for years by some of those self-opinionated no-hopers, and I'm enjoying a bit of own-back."

McGonagall regarded him.

"Weel, if that's the extent to your revenge, I accept that they have tae learn to no respond wi' corridor curses," she said. "I'd no' be sure I'd trust your conversion save for your care for that wee muggleborn lassie."

"First generation witch, please, Madam McGonagall; muggleborn is a trifle derogatory," said Lucius bowing. "Will you foxtrot with me?"

"Ye're a wee sumpf," said McGonagall, but permitted him to lead her into the dance. "Are ye no' wanting to dance wi' Miss Black for a slow number?"

"Oh, Narcissa and I are just friends," said Lucius. "I want to marry Kate; she's the most adorable girl I ever met, and her parents are amazing. I'm sure my father couldn't adapt to the muggle world as well as they are doing in the magical world, I love technology though, and Leo Cubitt is helping me to understand electricity. I have a few theories about how it might be very helpful against magical constructs like dementors. An electrical field also generates a magnetic field, which as we know is of vital importance in the placement of leylines because of the earth's natural magnetic field, and that means it might be possible to disrupt unwanted portkeys by the use of an electrical field."

"Oh my goodness!" said McGonagall. "Yes, I can see ye' have a good reason tae investigate protection against portkeys. Ye'll have been talking tae my wee rapscallions in the second, too."

"Yes, ma'am, Sev Snape has a very good line in crossing the line, if I may put it that way, between magic and technology," said Lucius. "I'm glad I won't have anything to do with being a prefect after next year, I wager his creativity will only increase."

"Och, he's a wee rascal," said Minerva, fondly.

 **Chapter 15**

Tobias stayed at Hogwarts over the holidays, where he became friendly with Argus Filch, who pointed out that they were relatives of a kind. Argus took to shooting like a duck to water, which he found a great relief, since his magic would never be strong enough to fight back if Death Eaters ever attacked. Hagrid preferred his crossbow, but Tobias talked him into keeping a gun filled with silver shot just in case of werewolves.

Tiberius remained in the castle over the holiday, in case of attack, and to be there for those students who were staying behind. Some of the muggleborn would be spending Yule with their new adoptive families, but some would be staying, along with their parents, to whom Tiberius issued an invitation. The Greengrasses were a little edgy about having muggles, so Lucius had elected to stay with Kate and her parents, and if his father chose to join them, as he wrote, he would be pleased.

Abraxus did turn up, and discovered to his amazement that the Cubitts were well educated.

"Are you sure this is good politics, boy?" he asked Lucius.

"Totally," said Lucius. "Also, I have much to say in my future wife's upbringing, and education, and she's startlingly intelligent. It's such a shame her cousin, Dan Granger, isn't magical, because he sounds a very clever boy too. I wouldn't mind betting, though, that he might just have magical offspring, so it would be wise to get to know that family too, Kate thinks he can see goblins, but they don't see him very often. I am trying to persuade Leo, Mr. Cubitt, that is, that his sister's son could be someone he should get to know better. If we can keep an eye on all the families of the first generation magical, we might even be able to trace back the connections and see which are more likely than others to throw up the so-called muggleborn."

"You've thought about this a lot."

"I have, father, and I'm more convinced than ever that blood purity is hocus pocus and superstition."

His father grunted.

"Well, I'll go along with your ideas and see where they take you. It beats bowing to some jumped up blood-liar with delusions of godhood."

oOoOo

Severus missed his grandfather over Christmas, but it was fun enough to be with his mum and Myrtle, and the Evans family. Auror Shacklebolt had called in a few times, since Eileen was to help defeat the curse on the DADA professorship by taking the spring term. He brought his nephew, Kingsley, to visit. Kingsley was a hyper-active seven-year-old, and it took the combined efforts of the four Marauders there to occupy him.

"Pity Peter's mother isn't well enough to move back onto the Prince estate or we could palm him off onto Peter, he's good natured enough not to mind," grumbled Petunia.

"Poor Peter, what has he done to deserve to be sentenced to babysitting?" said Severus. "Just think, in four years time, Kingsley will be in Hogwarts, when we're lordly Upper Sixth and some of us will be prefects."

"Well, Lily and Remus will," said Petunia. "You won't be, Sev; you invent too many spells for them to let you have the power of a badge, and I'm not interested in being Goody Twoshoes."

"No, you're more likely to be expelled for snogging Sirius and raping him in the broomcupboard," said Severus, rudely.

"I could go further and do worse," said Petunia, blushing.

"Merlin! And I was joking!" said Severus.

"It'd be a good alliance for the Noble and Inbred Black family though," said Petunia. "A daughter of the house of Prince, who is a descendent of Slytherin."

"Tuney, why weren't you sorted into Slytherin House?" asked Severus.

"Because we met Lucius when he was being a twat," said Petunia.

"Oh, yes, that was it," said Severus.

oOoOo

"Did you want me to try the ritual I invented so that Petunia Evans could awaken her magic and come to Hogwarts with her sister?" Tiberius asked Tobias, bluntly.

"You think I could do magic?"

"Probably no more than Argus, but let's face it, you can see goblins, and that's a big step in the right direction. And if you understood it more from the inside, you wouldn't fear it as much, so you wouldn't argue with Eileen as much, and as she will be teaching here, that would be to my advantage."

"I don't think there's a chance of getting back together; I've treated her too badly."

"Yes, but an amicable goblin-witnessed annulment sworn on your magic over incompatibility is going to get more respect from the wizarding world than if either of you wanted to remarry and going through the courts for a divorce."

"Is that possible? I thought the reason Eileen didn't divorce me was because of the social stigma."

"There is, with a divorce. However, an agreed annulment is another matter. Goblins have more rituals than wizards, and their ritual is acknowledged by wizarding society. Goblins mate for life because they perform rituals to find perfect partners, and undertake soul binding as a matter of course, which is rarely done by wizards nowadays. However, they acknowledge that trauma can change personalities and hold an annulment ceremony to separate those betrothed or married as children, usually in their own case before living together, but they recognise that wizarding folk do not marry with such care, and offer the annulment if it is truly amicably entered into."

"I see. So Eileen and I must feel no acrimony to each other, and swear on our magic to that effect, if I have some?"

"Yes, and I've spoken to Eileen about it, and she accepts that you were badly behaved because you felt the partnership uneven, as well as being frustrated not to be the breadwinner any more when your job closed."

"You are better at words than I am; I'm not clever."

"You are clever, Tobias; you worked out the non-acrimony implication for yourself."

"I feel none to Eileen; she's too classy for me."

"Or rather, you both have very different backgrounds. Good, I'll perform the ritual after tea."

Tobias was shortly astounded to be able to raise some sparks from a school wand, and Tiberius took him to London to get his own wand, and to meet up with Eileen for an amicable annulment.

OoOoOo

New term was soon upon them. Eileen travelled to Hogwarts to take up the post as professor of DADA; she had spent much of the holiday liaising with Leroy Jethro Shacklebolt, and Severus had a strong suspicion that the liaison had been about a lot more than the classes she was to teach. He had mixed feelings about the idea of being the stepson of an auror, even a retired one, but then, his mother mostly ceded his custody to Tiberius anyway.

Eileen turned out to be a good teacher. Her liaison with Shacklebolt meant that the lessons proceeded seamlessly, but Severus was worried.

"Mum, I don't know if the curse if affecting you," he said, after they had been back at school for a couple of weeks, "But I've noticed you looking pretty nauseated at breakfast time and not eating properly. I wonder if it's something about the classroom?"

Eileen embraced her son.

"Oh, Severus, you do take such good care of me. No, it's not the curse. I know what it is, though."

"You've caught something? Can Madam Pomfrey do anything about it?"

"Severus, how would you feel about a sister or brother?"

"You know I've always wanted siblings, but it's fine, mum, I have Tuney and Lily now, and loads of friends. Don't change the subject."

"Severus, this isn't easy if you're going to be dense," said Eileen, waspishly. "I mean, how would you like a little brother or sister?"

Severus blinked. Suddenly he joined all the dots. Why couldn't humans be as easy to understand as arithmancy? She was hurting and he had not realised!

"Are you telling me that rotten cad put you one up the spout without marrying you? I'm going to kill the bastard!" he shouted. Raw magic rolled off him and the floor shook and every shelf rattled.

Eileen took her son into her arms, firmly.

"It's not like that," she said. "It takes two to tango, you know!"

Severus was confused.

"He took you dancing?"

Eileen shut her eyes and counted to ten, sometimes Sev could be too literal.

"It's a saying," she said. "We ... Leroy and I, fucked shamelessly like rabbits, we were planning to get married at Easter, but it appears that I got pregnant despite the charms I was using."

"Oh, right," said Severus. "Why didn't you just say so?"

"I was trying to break it gently," said Eileen.

"Oh, right," said Severus again. "I don't think you can break things like that gently, it's like being a little bit pregnant. Doesn't work."

"Are you ... angry?" Eileen whispered.

"Why on earth would I be angry?" said Severus. "I'm not going to call Shack 'Dad' though. He isn't my dad. And I shall probably try to negotiate second opinions on discipline because the whole point of having a wildly complex parental set up is to manipulate it to the best advantage. I guess babies about the place will vary between great fun and wildly irritating. I was waiting for you to get it on with him enough to stop the waves of angst and uncertainty."

"Severus! All the angst and uncertainty were about how you'd take it!"

"Why? I just want you to be happy. It's not like he's likely to turn into another abuser, is he? Not an auror. They're screened for excessively violent tendencies, I was reading about it in 'Wizarding careers for young witches and wizards'. It's a good idea, you wouldn't want an auror who thinks he's Starsky and Hutch, or Dirty Harry."

Eileen hugged her son and laughed in joy. Sometimes he was such a funny little boy.

oOoOo

Tiberius looked up when Lucius came in with Kate by the hand.

"What can I do for you both?" he asked. He had finally managed to figure out how to break the password; a headmaster should be available to all children, all the time. Even overnight.

"Please, sir, some of the little snakes are being abused," said Lucius. "Kate told me about it, she's been putting together some clues."

Tiberius put his head on one side and smiled encouragingly at Kate.

"It's little things until they add up, sir," said Kate. "Bruises after the end of the holidays, or people moving like they're stiff. Tim Baker, the other muggleborn, I think he's having a hard time with his people accepting magic. He doesn't look as though he's been eating properly, and he was pretty skinny when he got here. Leodegas Burke, he's got nasty bruises where you wouldn't normally see, but I sort of invaded the shower a little bit because of him wincing."

"I see," said Tiberius. "I can see you being a fearless auror when you grow up."

Kate almost bounced.

"I want to be like Sherlock Holmes," she said. "And ... and the third one I'm a bit ... well it's odd. It's Primula Goyle, she's really withdrawn and she jumps if people touch her, but I haven't seen any bruises, well not really, and I asked her if there was a problem with her family and she said, 'None of your business. My daddy loves me very much indeed.' And it seemed ... odd. I can't think of another way to put it."

"I see," said Tiberius, who did see a lot more than Kate did.

"I told Professor Slughorn and he said that little boys always collect bruises from rough play and how could there be a problem if Primula felt loved? Only I wasn't happy, so I talked to Lucius and here we are."

"And I've got a shrewd idea what Gordon Goyle is up to," said Lucius.

"Yes, I concur, and no, Kate, neither of us is going to tell you yet," said Tiberius. "No child your age should even know about that, let alone experience it. Very well, Lucius, I will inform Professor Slughorn that I am going to have a full medical for all the firsties, in fact, I'll call a meeting of the house heads and have a full medical for every house's firsties, Professor Prince reported that she felt there was a child in Ravenclaw who needed looking over."

"Oh, Libby Cornfoot," said Kate. "I didn't know if I ought to mention her or not but she arrived on the train on the way back to school and she had such a bout of accidental magic the windows in her compartment shattered. And she's a bit quiet normally."

"There's a good observant child," said Tiberius. "I'll always listen if you have concerns about any of your school fellows, regardless of house or year. You're not the sort of child who would use it to tattle about people being quiet because of having been naughty, though in that case, talking to Lucius would be a good idea, or the other Marauders."

"Yes, sir!" said Kate.

She was certain it would get sorted out now.

Tiberius pinched the bridge of his nose as the two youngsters left. It was going to be a long couple of weeks, no doubt, while Poppy ran all the scans and he alerted child services as seemed appropriate. The Greengrasses would doubtless take one of the two abused boys. He floo-called Abraxus Malfoy.

"Tiberius! My boy in trouble?" Abraxus was wary.

"No, the contrary. I was wondering ... if there was a child in one of your vassal families who was being sexually abused, would you consider adopting her? Miss Cubitt brought me information which confused her, and she was quite worried."

"What, Lucius' pet mudblood? Shows some sense to come to you, anyway."

"The poor child showed a touching faith in Horace, but of course he didn't want to know," said Tiberius.

"Oh, Horace," said Abraxus, contemptuously. "I take it you are not going to tell me who?"

"I'd rather have it taken care of judiciously rather than have you assassinating willy-nilly," said Tiberius. "I'll let you know if the DMLE and child services don't come through."

Abraxus nodded.

"Fair enough," he said.

Tiberius called for a meeting with all his house heads and Poppy Pomfrey.

"I have had more than one report that some firsties might be suffering abuse," he said, baldly. "I want a full scan on them by Poppy. And I'll have scans by year of older ones too," he added. "I've been through Dumbledore's paperwork and I can't find any medical records on full scans during the first week in school, Poppy, do you keep them?"

"I don't do them; Albus didn't think it necessary," said Poppy.

Tiberius gave her a long, hard look. Legilimensy was unnecessary to realise what Poppy was thinking, a flicked look of scorn at Slughorn made it quite clear that Albus was willing to believe that it was Slytherin parents who were abusive and he didn't care. Naturally, none of his precious Gryffindors could be abused! Tiberius wondered if Poppy would uncover anything in Godric's house; Minnie meant well, but she was a trifle oblivious to personal problems amongst her lions.

oOoOo

The medical exam highlighted the three Slytherin Kate had pointed out, a Hufflepuff who was self-harming and in dire need of a mind healer through blaming herself for the deaths of her family at the hands of death eaters. Two Gryffindor muggleborn were suffering problems, one finding his father free with his hands because accidental magic had given his mother a nervous breakdown, and one whose parents were so abusive he had run away from home and was living rough. Libby Cornfoot was herself unhurt, but Poppy managed to coax her to talk about how upsetting she found it that her parents were fighting over an uncle having joined the Deatheaters. It was a messy situation, and short of sending a curt and accusing letter home, Tiberius could do little there. The rest, at least, he could deal with. Tim was to be fully adopted into the Greengrasse family, and Lucius claimed Leodegas Burke under Malfoy protection, as it had been his explanation about Lord Losealot which had set the boy on a different path to his parents. As promised, Abraxus also took in Primula, and Gordon Goyle found himself in Azkaban not just for child abuse but for using forbidden magic, as he had been trying to improve his magic for the Dark Lord by rather dodgy rituals involving a virgin, and deciding to keep it all in the family. Abraxus swept up all the smaller Goyles as well. He would not be a loving parent, but he would be a conscientious one, and they would be knee deep in loving house elves. Begonia, Nigella and Honeysuckle would not suffer the same abuse as their sister, though Begonia had been groomed. Small Hugo would never recall any other father. Gordon's brother Gregory tried to make a bid for his nieces and nephews, and Abraxus spoke to him quietly for ten minutes, leaving Gregory pale and shaking, and concentrating on his one son, Gorell1. Abraxus quite understood why Gregory might want more options for his line, since Gorell was positively moronic, a boy in the fourth year in Slytherin with less subtlety, as Abraxus said, than a Gryffindor on alihotsy.

 **Chapter 16**

Tiberius was worried about the Marauders. They had been very well behaved for far too long, unless one counted the Ice Slide incident in the third floor corridor, but there had been a warning notice and a narrow walkway, and he had ignored it until it had been extended to include a ski-jump down the stairs into a cushioning charm. It was too damaging to the blood pressure of adults watching small children launching themselves out into space shouting "Geronimo!" before crashing into a thick layer of invisible cushioning 30 feet below.

The staff had banned the use of it and had played with it after curfew before removing it as a hazard.

It was of some relief to Tiberius when the Marauders in Gryffindor rose as a body, and chanted,

" _Ravenclaws are swotty nuts_

 _We think them far too driven_

 _Hufflepuff are too sedate_

 _And can't from home be riven_

 _Slytherin are toerags_

 _Up to sneaky tricks_

 _We think that covers everyone_

 _So punishment can stick."_

"Severus, please be spokesman and tell me what that nonsense was about?" said Tiberius, pinching the bridge of his nose to forestall a headache.

"Well, sir, you said that insulting another house would lead to a week's detention living in that house, so we thought if we insulted everyone we'd get a sabbatical in each and make more friends, and understand everyone better," said Severus.

"Besides, the only founder's portrait we've found is Sal's, so we wanted to go poking around for more," said Petunia.

"Why me?" said Tiberius, plaintively.

"You did make it a promise of retribution," said James, hopefully. "We wanted to work in a spirit of interhouse co-operation."

"Only you Marauders would insult people in the spirit of co-operation," said Tiberius. "Right. I'm going to make a decree, that for three weeks, anyone may sleep in any house they want, and we shall have a fifth table for interhouse friendships. I know there's no rule to stop you eating at any table you want - no, there really isn't except for the first and last feast of every year," he added as there were amazed gasps. "But a fifth table allows more mixing. All passwords are cancelled forthwith, and if you can't pass the riddle to get into Ravenclaw Tower, tough luck, you aren't smart enough to deserve it."

"Oh, sir, it's the simplest thing, a brain-damaged troll or Gorell Goyle could get in," said Petunia.

"But she repeats herself," said Sirius. "Even the Parkinson twins could get such simple riddles."

"Thank you, Miss Evans, Mr. Black, you may each return me one hundred lines on Manners Maketh Man," said Tiberius. Neither the Goyle boy nor Melliflua and Laetitia were ever likely to find their way into Ravenclaw Tower, a brain-damaged troll probably really would have more chance. But he had to protect them, and it was as well to quieten this line of discussion before the Ravenclaws became too sniffy.

And if they managed to increase the difficulty of riddles asked, well, it would do the Marauders good to have to think for once.

oOoOo

The mingling of the houses worked better than Tiberius might have hoped. Ignatius Weasley would never, of course, sully himself in any other house, and most Ravenclaws declined to move as well, but there was otherwise quite a lot of room-hopping out of sheer curiosity, and Lucius arranged a rota of enemies of Tom Riddle to watch and firmly sit on any supporters of Lord Losealot to prevent them from causing harm to any children visiting. It was mostly the younger years who thought it good fun to visit, but Narcissa spent some time in Ravenclaw Tower, which became very crowded since most of its inmates declined to move, and the Marauders en masse and spanning the other three houses as well as their two Ravenclaw members accounted for a significant addition, especially with Peter and Charity too. The Marauders and friends were entirely untroubled by this, and merely scrawled runes all over the room Xeno shared with another boy, and enlarged it by a factor of five, with a curtain down the middle to have boys one side and girls the other. Xeno's room mate, an inoffensive boy named Nigel Borage, was much impressed.

In the end, Tiberius cancelled long house tables entirely, planning to keep them only for the first and last days of the year, and installed round tables.

It might be noted that there were three round tables entirely inhabited by Ravenclaws, christened by Severus "Featherhead Hall". There was a single table which was known as the Junior Deatheater table, and another known as the HuffleGruff table where conservative Gryffindors consented to share with conservative Hufflepuffs.

"I'm wondering whether to abolish houses entirely," said Tiberius to Minerva. She looked scandalised.

"It's traditional!" she said. "Besides, the ward stones are tied to four houses."

"The second reason sways me more than the first," said Tiberius. "A level of competition is probably good now we have largely eroded the house divides, which is why I'm not giving house points to your Marauder group as they have members in every house."

"For a bunch of wee sumpfs and pranksters, they haven't done a bad job," said Minerva, smugly.

The novelty of spending time in other houses largely diffused the usual problems of the spring term, and as well as house quidditch matches, several all-house knockabout teams got off the ground as the weather improved, and interhouse projects in the all-house common room and hobbies suite came to fruition, including an ambitious but cleverly executed appliqué hanging of the four founders as friends for the great hall. The time leading up to the Easter holidays was spent, on the whole, convivially, and before they knew where they were, the Marauders were going home for the holidays, pointing and giggling at Narcissa and Xeno, who had to remain to revise for their OWLs.

Severus thought he might have preferred to have stayed at school when he found out that he was expected to be a page boy for his mother's wedding.

Leroy Shacklebolt took him aside.

"I won't be comfortable in a formal monkeysuit either," he said, "But it'll make your mother happy."

Severus rolled his eyes for form's sake.

"Yessir," he said. "I hope my friends won't see photos."

"Oh, if they comment, I have pictures of all of them in costumes equally as embarrassing," said Shacklebolt.

"Blackmail material? Wicked!" said Severus.

Having a picture of James dressed as a Christmas elf, and Sirius with Regulus in even worse formal garb than his own costume was balm to Severus' spirit. The girls would be bridesmaids of course and would get over having seen him in a high necked, tight-sleeved frilled robe.

And he did want his mother to be happy.

"And though I thank you for the pictures, this is the point when I tell you that if you hurt my mum, I will hex your balls off," he said.

"I wouldn't expect any less, but did you think you could take me?"

"If I set up runic arrays? Piece of piss," said Severus.

The middle aged auror laughed.

"Yes, actually, you could do it that way," he said. "Which is a good lesson to me that there's always someone out there who can take me, even if he's a thirteen year old kid. Take the same lesson, Severus; there's always someone better than you."

"Yes. And the corollary to the less is 'so learn to cheat,'" said Severus. "Because in real war there ain't no such thing as rules and fair turns."

"You'll do," said Shacklebolt.

oOoOo

The wedding went off very well, and Eileen looked years younger. It helped that her morning sickness had settled down and sorted itself out. The bride was radiant, the groom was nervous, the bridesmaids were ecstatic and the page boy was grim, which is more or less the paradigm of all weddings. Severus celebrated, with the aid of his sisters, by brewing a potion which made anyone who drank it exude cat pheromones with which to dose the male professors when they got back to school.

It exceeded expectations.

Not only were Tiberius, Horace Slughorn and Filius Flitwick the recipients of the affections of every cat familiar in the school, as well as Mrs. Norris, but also Madam McGonagall was stalking both Tiberius and Filius. For some reason even pheromones failed to overcome what Severus considered was a very natural aversion to Professor Slughorn.

Filius Flitwick took the opportunity to propose, and there was to be another wedding in the school. Severus felt quite smug about that; it had only needed a little nudge. He was fond of Minerva McGonagall, and he had always felt that the little Charms master admired her. She deserved a bit of happiness.

He made Flitwick an aftershave which included catnip in it.

oOoOo

In a seaside cottage in Devon, Dumbledore wondered whether he should ask Tiberius how the horcrux hunting was going, or whether he should keep someone as potentially powerful as Tiberius in the dark about where he suspected Tom might be planning to hide another horcrux. It wa sn't so far from Mermaid Cottage that Tom had gone on holiday with his orphanage; it wouldn't do any harm to just go and look.

It was several weeks before anyone realised he was missing.

oOoOo

The Marauders celebrated their return to school by turning the staircase from the astronomy tower into a slide, and proceeded to toboggan down it on shields borrowed from suits of armour, flying back to the top of the tower on broomsticks for another go.

The impromptu and outsize helter-skelter attracted the attention of the rest of the school wanting to have a go, and Tiberius cancelled lessons on the proviso that anyone who participated wrote him half an inch per year of their age on the charms required and the safeguards needed. The Marauders, being thorough, had set up cushioning charms all the way round.

It was considered by most to be a fair trade, and even the stuffier older Ravenclaws sneaked up to have a go, claiming it was in the spirit of experimentation and studying charms.

Nobody believed them as they shrieked with as much gay abandon as an eleven year old Gryffindor.

oOoOo

Classes settled down much better for a day of silliness, and the exam students were much calmer.

"It might not be a bad idea to do that every year," said Tiberius, to the staff at a staff meeting.

"It was really very stimulating!" squeaked Flitwick.

"I was concerned for the dangers until I discovered the cushioning charms," admitted Minerva, who had refused point blank to ride a shield down the helter-skelter, and her new husband claimed that all her fur was standing on end. Minerva did not dignify that remark with a comment. Tiberius had also refrained from riding it, more for the sake of the dignity of his position than anything else. He had a sneaking suspicion that Dumbledore would have ridden it with great pleasure.

He certainly planned to have something similar to break the tensions of those about to be involved in exams another year.

oOoOo

Severus looked up as the big owl swooped down towards Tiberius at breakfast, wondering who it belonged to. It was not a Ministry owl nor a Gringotts owl, but it was self-important.

It was not self-important for long; as it started to extend the leg with the small parcel on it, there was an explosion, which ripped the owl apart and sprayed Tiberius with the contents of the parcel as well as bits of owl. Tiberius stood briefly, and then went a sickly hue as he clutched at his throat and chest. Severus screamed. So did Eileen.

Eileen cast a bubblehead charm and ran to her grandfather's side, her wand casting diagnostics. She glowered at Professor Slughorn.

"Don't just stand there, you fat old imbecile, give me the bezoar in your pocket," she demanded.

Severus had also run forward.

"The wards have fallen," Tiberius croaked, before losing consciousness.

Severus put his wand to his throat.

"Voldemort is at the gates," he said, ignoring the gasps and screams. "Father, take the sharpshooters to the parapets. Spell aces, join them. Petunia, wake up Ssthass and get him up here; we're going on a war ride."

Petunia looked startled but ran off towards what had once been Myrtle's loo. The Marauders all fell into step with Severus as, grim faced, he followed her. Peter and Charity joined them.

"You don't have to come, you're not Marauders," said James.

"Sometimes you h...have to find courage," said Peter. Charity nodded.

James grinned.

"Then welcome," he said.

Petunia surged out of the bathroom on Ssthass's neck.

"That's a fucking big snake," said Lucius.

Ssthass hissed.

"He said you have fucking poncy hair," said Petunia. "Sev, what are we doing?"

Severus jumped up onto Ssthass's back and ran up onto the basilisk's head.

"We're doing what Salazar Slytherin designed Ssthass to do. We're defending the school and all its pupils. Mount up, Marauders, we are going to war."

"Sev, your great grandfather ..." Sirius was concerned.

"If he lives he lives. If he dies, I'm not going to let that bastard son of a bitch take over the school by scaring us out of our minds," said Severus in a tight voice. "He's in mum's hands and she's a better potioneer than Slughorn any day of the week. If he can be saved, he will be saved, if not, then I'm the heir to House Prince and I'm going to do what my House Head would want of me."

Sirius nodded.

He could understand that now he had a better relationship with his father.

oOoOo

Voldemort was laughing. It was childishly simple. He had placed a ward on the owl knowing that its death meant the rapid death of the only other man besides Dumbledore who had any chance of overcoming him. With the headmaster incapacitated, the wards wavered enough for his wardbreakers to break through, and he and his death eaters surged through the gates of the castle. He strolled up the drive in a leisurely fashion; there was plenty of time. And once inside, then he could finish off that pert Prince brat.

There appeared to be defiance from the parapets, and a wing of his deatheaters fell to some spell that penetrated their shields.

It was gunfire he could hear; he had heard the home guard practising when he was a youth.

"Stiffen your physical shields," he said. It would be of some use.

And the doors of the castle were opening. Surely the brats weren't planning to fight? He was twenty feet from the steps now, and as the dark gap widened, he gazed in horror at the basilisk he had once set on the school, with a host of children on its back and that impudent Prince brat stood with one foot forward like a surfer, riding on its head.

Ssssssss _obey me_ ssssss hissed Voldemort.

Sssssss _in your dreamsss_ ssssss replied Ssthass.

"Lunchtime, Ssthass," said Severus. "You can kill him now, we got all the horcruxes."

Ssthass opened the second membrane on his eyes as Voldemort's horrified screech died on his lips.

oOoOo

By the time the aurors arrived, it was all over, and Ssthass was happily digesting death eaters. He was only allowed to eat those who had been formally identified, so that there would be no problems with the paperwork.

The head of the DMLE stared.

Ssthass had hooded his eyes again.

"Bloody hell, someone send for a beast executioner," said the Auror in charge.

"I wouldn't if I were you," said Severus.

"Stand aside, boy, that beast is perilous!" the Auror was terrified. "By the order of the ministry it is to be destroyed!"

"Oh? After having killed Voldemort for us? Really?" drawled Severus.

"I ... I have no choice."

"I do hope you'll be ready to explain to the top families how you came to kill so many heirs, because you'll be going through us before you touch Ssthass," said Severus. "Heir Prince for one. That's me."

"Heir Black." Sirius looked every inch a young aristocrat.

"Spare Black." Regulus crossed his arms and stood beside his brother.

"Heir Potter." James slung an arm around Severus and Sirius.

Frank, who had followed the Marauders out, hesitated briefly.

"Heir Longbottom," he said, loudly.

"Heir Malfoy." Lucius drawled. "And the official betrothed of the Heir," he added as Kate wormed her way into his arms beside him.

"Heir Slytherin," said Petunia, sneering. "After all, Ssthass told me he was made by the will of all the founders, to protect the school and this is what he has done. He says it took a while to persuade Godric Gryffindor who had a broom so far up his arse it raised his eyebrows. Hey, Ssthass, most of us are in Gryffindor's house."

Sssss _what Slytherin would think to have a head on assault as a war ride?_ ssssss said Ssthass, sarcastically.

"And now we are going back in with Ssthass, and if anyone attacks, they will regret it," said Severus. The heirs followed the basilisk, walking backwards, and with drawn wands.

The Aurors left them to it; they really could not afford to offend so many heirs of such prominent houses.

"Of course we do have a problem," said Severus, soberly, having seen the Chamber of Secrets secured for Ssthass's safety.

"Beyond your great grandfather's injuries?" asked James.

"Yes. Bellatrix Black-Lestrange got away," said Severus. "Let's go see how mum got on with Grandfather."

oOoOo

Eileen met them.

"What happened?" she asked.

"Voldemort turned up with uninvited guests. We, or rather Ssthass killed them," said Severus.

"I wish you weren't quite so laconic," said Eileen.

"If we weren't laconic we'd be throwing up," said Severus. "And we're all holding together to know how Grandfather is."

"He's going to live," said Eileen. "He lost his wand hand in the explosion, and he may end up blind, but he's going to live, and he's stubborn enough to be more capable than anyone else without the disabilities."

Severus' shoulders relaxed in relief.

"Your father lost an arm to a bludgeoning spell," said Eileen.

"Bastards," growled Severus. "Can I see him?"

"Not yet," said Eileen.

"You aren't going into labour early or anything are you?" the boy asked, suspiciously.

"I'm a Prince; we're made of sterner stuff than that," said Eileen.

"Good," said Severus, giving her a sudden, fierce hug.

All the Marauders, and those who had joined them, ended up in the Come and Go room, cuddling, sobbing, being sick, and being plied with hot chocolate by house elves.

"We can make the headmaster a prosthetic hand," said Sirius. "We could put runes from Tyr's Aett on it to pinch the bum of any attractive woman."

"Or we could make him a prosthetic hand without any pranks on it," said Severus. "Otherwise you'll be locked in his office under polyjuice as a cover girl for Witch Weekly."

"Oh, well, it was a thought," said Sirius.

"It was a bad thought," said Severus.

oOoOo

Those taking exams this year might have been forgiven for doing badly, but Lucius Malfoy stood up and said,

"I know I'm not taking my NEWTs until next year, but if I was, I'd want to surpass myself as a gift to the headmaster to aid his speedy recovery."

"Dear me," murmured Minerva. "I have to say that I think Mr. Malfoy might make a rather more admirable head boy next year than I might have imagined a couple of years ago."

"And you can't make Severus head boy in his third year," teased Filius.

Minerva sighed.

"Why is it scary that he might make a better job of it than many seventh years we've had as heads in the past?" she said.

oOoOo

The Marauders visited Tiberius and Tobias, and Tobias was somewhat reconciled to the loss of his arm to be plastered all over the Daily Prophet as the Courageous Muggle, who gave an arm to protect the children of Hogwarts. Tiberius, who was sensible to all that was going on, even if still under eye bandages, had every intention of making sure he had a wizarding prosthetic, which would be better than the rather crude ones made by muggles.

And Severus had to admit that the picture of him standing on Ssthass's head was a rather fine front page photo, and asked the Ravenclaw girl who had taken it for a print.

It had been a busy year, but ultimately, a very successful one.

 **End of year 2**

I am considering having Bella become a Dark Lady and continue to be a nuisance.

* Dear readers, don't go telling me this is Stockholm Syndrome because it won't be for more than a year. The incident which coined that name happened in 1973. This is 1972.

1 Yes, this is Gregory Goyle's father. Gorell is from OFr Gorel, meaning pig.


End file.
